Julius

These Spain 1-2s and the pace of them are PTSD-inducing

Palmer on for Mainoo was absolutely the change to make. Mainoo has had a great tournament but went missing or just wasn't making the right challenges in the first half, shows a lot of attacking intent from Gareth too. Something we don't see too often, because it's not at all like-for-like. Anyways, momentum swings our way for a change. Let's see how this pans out.

Let's go

It's night and day compared to the first half, though, when there were arguably too many players filling up the middle of the pitch. At times it's like they've forgotten where their position is and where they've been winning duels -- like @Eddage said, Saka seems pretty disinterested in coming back and doing defending all of a sudden. It's all very odd

Seeing the ball come into Bellingham and being surrounded by four red shirts then him somehow getting the turn and shot away this is why we need to make sure we've got people available in the middle - why was he the only one?

Shocked to see Kane come off with 30 to go, purely because he's the captain, but had to be done. We've vacated the middle of the pitch for some reason during some of our attacks. Very odd.

We've come out here completely turned off. We're handing the ball back to Spain nonstop and then seem surprised that it's coming right back at us.

Where the hell is our defence?! 4v5 at the back?!?!

Damn. Just torn us apart. First time Yamal wasn't closed down for the first time this match and immediately made something of it. Game should really open up now.

Zubimendi on for Rodri could be a massive blow for Spain and a massive invite for us to make something of this. Wonder what's happened there? Zubimendi is a quality player, mind you, so don't go counting your chickens quite yet.

As far as first halves in major international finals go, that was a perfectly fine one – we've seen way worse, scrappier, and more negative a lot of times before. Both teams look positive, wanting to move the ball forward when they get it, and, outside of a few spells of Spain playing keep-ball, it's been going from left to right and back again at a decent clip. Some really fun duels to watch so far. Carva taunting with a crying baby action probably the highlight for me, Carva v Bellingham, Walker v Williams, Shaw v Yamal...definitely the ones to keep an eye on. And speaking of Shaw, probably Man of the Half, right? He's shut everything down and created some decent opportunities. We also saw Stones handle Williams really well before putting a slide in, I thought he'd shown him maybe a bit too much space on the outside and he definitely needed to stretched, but it was really well handled. Spain have been doubling up on the right at times which gets me the most nervous, but they've seemed fairly contained otherwise, and the middle of the pitch is overloaded at the moment and so it's getting very scrappy, which hasn't really suited Mainoo so far – as the legs start to go and more space opens up in the middle, that'll be the place to look for more of the action and opportunities I think. Especially with the high press Spain have going on. It's 0-0, we're still in it, we've had chances and we'll undoubtedly get some more – but so will Spain. Great stretch at the end by Foden to get that shot on target. This scoreline at half-time is probably a best case scenario for England so far, because we can't defend a lead for anything, and I'd hate for us to be chasing. Let's hope for a couple of goals in this second half. Or, well, maybe just the one if it's from a white shirt Saka has been an interesting one. Every single time it's passed out to him it feels like a shotgun being reloaded. Wouldn't shock me if he unlocks this Spain defence down the right/their left.

Just under 10 to go. Would love to see an England win, but Spain have been, by far and away, the best team in Germany over the last month. If they put in a performance on par with their worst at the tournament so far I think they come away with it. But with how England have turned up again, and again, and again at the last moment, this is one of those matches that could be 0-0, 1-0, 5-0 or 3-3. So long as we're not 2 goals or more behind with 10 to spare, I feel like we'll be in with a shot. The obvious duels are on the flanks but the middle of the pitch is where I think this one is going to be decided. Expectations in check but let's keep those fingers crossed, eh?

Congrats @FalcoLombardi!!

UEFA's decision to not have assists help decide top goalscorer has to be one of the more baffling of the relatively inconsequential decisions they've made in a while. There are SIX players on three goals, and if neither one of Kane and Olmo score tonight, the Golden Boot is going to be shared between all six. Who would win if assists were considered, you ask? As things stand, Olmo on 3 goals + 2 assists in 5 games, who has been one of the best players of the tournament and would be more than deserving of it in my opinion. Barmy.

Food delivered; nerves fried. Is tonight the night where we can finally start talking just a little less about '66?

The ESRB rating for the game has just confirmed that Link will be a playable character. This could just pertain to what I imagine is the intro that we saw in the trailer, though I could also see Link being unlocked for some potential end- or post-game content?

Really, genuinely surprised it has taken this long. We've had close to a decade of this guy in politics and after all of the nonsense, NOW, HERE, LIKE THIS is how you go about it? ...and then imagine waiting this long and then really just badly grazing him. Not to condone the actions, obviously, but yeah...what a dumbass. RIP to the person who died and hopefully the two others being reported as critically injured make a full and speedy recovery. Totally agree. His audience is already mental, this somehow elevates him further in their eyes. This is how even the most vile of people become deified - they need to be seen as some sort of unkillable target - and it absolutely now becomes a historic image like you say. The only way it would have done anything would be if they hit the target and got the end result. Again, I'm not condoning violence here or saying this is right – but you have all this prep time and you whiff? It's insane to me. This feels like the kind of thing trump can easily use in his favour now to push for a call to arms. And we've seen him do it before, so...feel sorry for a lot of America and what's coming. As if it wasn't already going badly with everything surrounding Biden, it feels like it just got a whole lot worse.

I've been doing a much better job than I typically do this year of picking up games I'll get to ASAP rather than filling up my (digital and physical) shelves, but a Nintendo Switch first-party bundle with the games at £25 a pop? Yeah, ordered, zero hesitation on my part thanks for sharing Ashley! I actually started making a list of Switch games I hadn't picked up a couple of months ago and wanted to at some point, but as soon as the list started to get a little long gave up because of the massive investment it would clearly be. Think I'll try to make looking out for deals like these my main way of picking up those Switch games I haven't got to unless I urgently want to get to them! Absolutely insane deal! Thankfully (for my sanity) I already have Skyward Sword HD on my shelf, so don't feel bad about missing out EDIT: the MK8D Booster Course Pass is only £8.97 from Currys. Which is a pretty great deal too!

Bosman continues to nail it: The post-credits breakdown of that Xbox ad really cracked me up

All-aluminium Analogue Pockets announced: They look reeeeeeeeeally nice Price of a PS5 and a bit though, with the Switch 2 potentially less than 9 months away? Think I'll wait

Reminder to anyone interested in the Game Vouchers offer that this offer it is set to end on Sunday!

Because we're N-Europe and not N-America, obviously!

Seems like it'll tickle the fancy of some here

Glad they got the recast out of the way ASAP. Looks...fine? I'm finding it really hard to get hyped for many MCU projects these days, we've had it a few too many times in the last few years where a solid trailer results in a bang average film or worse, so... Hope it turns out well, but I'm not holding my breath. What I'm really not looking forward to just how toxic conversation is going to get around having a black Captain America with his own film, probably going to be much louder than it usually is with that corner of the internet what with the US elections and the run-in taking us up pretty much until this releases.

A trio of games previously unreleased outside of Japan - Densetsu no Starfy 1-3 - arrive on NSO for GBA...today!