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By Tyler Erzberger
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After game one, it looked as if England were ready to plant their flag and announce to the world that this was a team capable of scoring in bunches and challenging for the trophy at the World Cup.
While the final two matches put a bit of a damper on that statement, England is still into the knockouts as the winner of their group and have an achievable side of the bracket to make a deep run.
But how do they grade for their group stage performance?
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Let's dig in.
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Expectation
I was incredibly high on England moving into the World Cup, believing that Thomas Tuchel was the man to guide this team to the semifinals and beyond after getting so close to trophies at the Euros.
The first game with Croatia was a scary one, but they should have easily glided through Ghana and Panama to make it to the Round of 32 as the winners of the quartet. Any trouble against the latter two teams would be considered a failure, while getting a win over Croatia to start the tournament would be a gigantic boost.
Reality
Funnily enough, England looked their best against Croatia, the hardest opponent of the group.
They could have scored six or seven on the day against the team that beat them in the World Cup semifinals eight years ago, but then followed it up with a disappointing performance against Ghana in a draw. They took care of business against Panama in a 2-0 win, but even that was a labored effort, only breaking through the adversary's defense in the second half.
England want to play a proactive game and seem at their best when they're swinging wildly in the ring with another motivated fighter, but have truly struggled against teams who can bring physicality and hunker down in their defensive end. While on paper, the Round of 32 game against DR Congo should be a straightforward win, the African nation feels like a better version of the Ghana team that grabbed a result from them.
Final Grade: B+
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