The Three Lions failed to go beyond the quarter-final stage in a major international tournament. This was despite having some of the world’s best players scattered all over the pitch.
Before Gareth Southgate took England to the 2018 World Cup semi-final and the 2020 Euro final, the last time the Three Lions reached a major semi-final was under Terry Venables in Euro 96.
In 2017, three members of that squad, Steven Gerrard, Frank Lampard and Rio Ferdinand, discussed the same on BT Sport.
They all agreed that their club rivalries hindered them when it came to international duty. Former Manchester United defender Ferdinand in particular claimed he didn’t want to sit near Liverpool players due to the rivalry.
However, speaking on The Overlap YouTube channel to Gary Neville, Beckham disagreed with those sentiments. The former Manchester United and Real Madrid midfielder captained England in three tournaments between 2002-2006 under Sven-Goran Eriksson. Beckham claimed (per Give Me Sport):
He added:
England will face USA, Wales and Iran in the FIFA World Cup in Qatar later this year.
David Beckham admits England WAGs went “too far” at 2006 World Cup
Arguably England’s greatest opportunity to win football’s biggest tournament since their only victory in 1966 was the 2006 World Cup in Germany. It will forever go down as arguably one of the nation’s biggest missed sporting opportunities.
They had world-class players as aforementioned, as well as Wayne Rooney, Ashley Cole and John Terry. However, even with all of them hitting their peaks around that time, England lost on penalties to Portugal in the quarter-finals.
Plenty of blame was placed on the wives and girlfriends (WAGs) for stealing the spotlight from the players, something which Beckham agreed with.
The 47-year-old said (as per The Mail):
He added:
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