England has not played its best football, far from it….Some players looking off form like Foden, Saka, Rice even Bellingham and Kane…

However, England finished first and now is on the right side of the draw…

England’s path to the final would include:

• Beating Slovakia
• Beating Switzerland or Italy
• Beating Romania or Netherlands or Austria or Turkey

Besides Switzerland and Austria, none of the team has played well so far but of course, Italy and Netherlands have quality players and coaches and can always pull a rabbit out of the hat…But honestly, this is the right side of the draw and if somehow Southgate finally gets the right set up, England should be in the Final.

On the other side, France has a mountain to climb:

• Beat Belgium
• Beat Portugal (or Slovenia)
• Beat Spain or Germany or Georgia or Denmark

So here is my prediction for the final 4:

• Portugal – Germany
• England – Netherlands

And for the final:

• = Portugal – England

Winner: TBD

I also think that France will lose next round and that Deschamps may be asked to leave although he just said he ll stay until 2026…

Fan-favourite Ramsdale will leave AFC this summer, not having done much wrong and feeling he has not been treated fairly…With Raya set to join us permanently, who could become our back-up GK? Do we need a promising GK or a seasoned GK? In any case, we need one that can ably deputize in case Raya gets hurt…Areola? Lunin? PiG? Bulka? Flekken? Sels? Navas?

Gabriel-Saliba are an excellent CB duo, probably the best we had in over a decade…For some reason, Arteta likes Kiwior but Kiwior has not really given us much certainty in terms of strength, pace and even positioning. We definitely need another CB, one that can really challenge Saliba-Gabriel. I like Branthwaithe, Singo, Fofana (if he gets fit again), Van den Berg, even Tarkowski. Unfortunately, Scalvini got injured so he is not an option at the moment…

So who do you think should join us in these positions?

When Ljunberg took over and when Arteta started on our bench right after, there was a sense that our team will over the years be full of Academy Players…We were very excited about Saka, ESR, Nketiah, RN, Willock AMN and there were also some buzz around Okwonko, John-Jules, M’Haland…

A few years forward and now only Saka has retained his spot in our starting XI, ESR has been relegated to a mostly unused sub and Nketiah to a sub…RN has some involvement but also limited. AMN and Willock are gone and other academy players are either out on loan or still in the academy…

Clearly, our academy does have some talent and there seems to be some type of grooming being done in terms of playing style since Arteta has joined the club to ensure that our Academy players are being prepared for first team football…

Yet, barring Saka, there does not seem to be a real spot for them in the starting XI and less and less on the bench…We could see ESR, Nketiah, RN leave this summer…It would not be a good signal to the academy players…

So is it the end of Hale End in our starting XI but also as an attractive spot for Top Talent in the UK?