Match Summary

Belgium Team

England made five changes for this match against Belgium, to see who would win the right for third place in the tournament.  It is always a difficult match for any teams to contest, and perhaps they should consider doing what they do in Olympic boxing and present both beaten semi-finalists with a bronze medal?  Anyway the match went ahead in St Petersburg and Belgium, with their first attack, scored.

It came on four minutes after England had made a promising start.  Belgium, probably the best team on the breakaway in the tournament, swiftly broke down the left through Nacer Chadli, who outpaced Kieran Trippier, to run on to Romulu Lukaku's pass.  He centred for Thomas Meunier to get ahead of the daydreaming Danny Rose to convert a simple tap-in goal.  Very poor defending by England, but it was the sign of things to come.  On 12 minutes Belgium nearly scored again after another very quick break.  This time the ball fell to Kevin de Bruyne, and although his shot was deflected, Jordan Pickford managed to block the ball and it was cleared.

England tried to hit back and both Fabian Delph and Reuben Loftus-Cheek had efforts easily saved by Thibaut Courtois, but then, as play swung to the other end, de Bruyne threaded a pass through for Lukaku.  Thankfully the big striker's control let him down and Pickford was able to smother the ball.  England would have preferred it if Belgium's two world class stars, de Bruyne and Eden Hazard, had not turned on their form for this match, but unfortunately they both played superbly, giving England problems for the whole 90 minutes.

To be fair, England pushed forward at every opportunity and a good run into the box by the impressive Loftus-Cheek, won a corner.  England, in their well-rehearsed way, made good use of their corners and this time Harry Maguire's header was saved by Courtois.  On 24 minutes England had a golden chance to equalise and it fell to the one man you would want it to fall to, Harry Kane.  A fine long pass forward by Eric Dier, found Raheem Sterling, who laid the ball into the path of Kane.  The striker didn't quite connect with his shot though and the ball flew wide.  It needed to be on target at least, and that was very disappointing.

Sterling was often caught in possession by the determined Belgium defenders, and when the Belgians broke away, boy, did they break quickly.  From one such incident only a good block by Maguire stopped Youri Tielemens shot.  There were so many times during this game where an England attack ended with a Belgian attempt at our goal, so swift was the movement of this talented team.  Belgium also nullified the England wing-backs as both Trippier and Rose were ineffective going forward.  Sterling was often too deep leaving Kane with a thankless task up front on his own.  At the back John Stones was having another excellent game and he kept Lukaku quiet again following another breakaway.  The first half had been a difficult one for England as Belgium seemed to want the third place finish a little more.  They will be the same as England in many ways, as they too will regret losing their semi-final, especially as they were one of, if not the best, side in the competition.

The only hope was that England had played poorly in this first half, which was the opposite to their other games, where the second half was worse.  The hope was that this will be the other way round.  Sure enough England began the second half much more on the front foot.  By bringing on Jesse Lingard and Marcus Rashford for Rose and Sterling, Gareth Southgate livened up the forward options.  On 51 minutes England went close when Trippier's cross needed a clearance by Jan Vertonghen and two minutes later, after Stones had been booked for a foul on Hazard, it was England’s turn to break quickly, but Trippier's cross was again cut out.  On 54 minutes a quick throw let Lingard in on goal but his shot-cum-cross missed the far post and missed Kane's lunging foot.  Once again England could not make this better spell tell with a goal, something they need to work on. 

Meanwhile, de Bruyne was still running things, and another fine pass found Lukaku only for the striker's control to let him down again.  England were still battling away though, and there was a case for a penalty when substitute Thomas Vermaelen jumped into the back of Rashford to flatten him.  Dire then shot at goal from longer range, easily saved by Courtois, and then a minute later England had their clearest chance to date.  A fine move sent Dire clear on goal and as Courtois came out Dire dinked the ball over him only for his Tottenham teammate Tobias Alderweireld to race back and clear off the goalline.  It was another golden chance that England missed and it was to prove costly.  Trippier saw a free-kick cleared and then Lingard's ball in was headed wide by Dier, the third chance the Spurs player had missed.  The pressure on Belgium was building though and after Rashford was fouled Maguire headed wide from the free-kick.

All the time England were attacking they had to be aware of the counter-attack from Belgium.  One break saw three against two but another substitute, Dries Mertens shot wide from the chance.  In the 80th minute Belgium almost scored the goal of the tournament.  A wonderful break and some superb one-touch passes went from an England attack to the other end in seconds.  The ball was teed up for Meunier to fire in a shot but Pickford saved the day with an excellent save.  You had to admire the build up to that one though.

With ten minutes left, and England throwing everything forward, the inevitable happened.  Another fantastic breakaway led by de Bruyne, saw him pass to Hazard, catching Phil Jones on his heels.  Hazard was through and calmly slotted the ball past the helpless Pickford.  Talk about a lesson in the simplicity of scoring a goal.  However, that showed those two Belgian stars at their absolute best.

Dele Alli came on for Loftus-Cheek, but that was a killer goal, and only a fine tackle by the impressive Stones saved another chance for Belgium.  The match ended with Belgium in control and thoroughly deserving their win.  It was a better showing by England in the second half, but the worrying thing was they never really looked like scoring, whereas Belgium looked likely every time they went forward.

It was a tough end to what had been, overall, a good and enjoyable tournament for England, but there are so many things the team can still work on, and under Southgate, surely, they can only get better.  They produced some memorable moments in the competition, but all the talk of the players being 'heroes' was a little exaggerated, as let's face it, we played seven games and lost three of them!  There was lots to be proud of though, and much to build on.  Only time will tell where the team goes next.  The players would have learned so much from this World Cup and I'm sure it is exciting times ahead, let's hope so.
    

TheFA.com BBC Sport

FIFA.com Mike Payne - football historian and contributor