England’s Phil Foden said the players need to shoulder some of the blame for the team’s shaky performances at Euro 2024 and that he feels sorry for manager Gareth Southgate, who has been subjected to heavy criticism.

England have sputtered through their four games in Germany with Jude Bellingham’s last gasp bicycle kick and Harry Kane’s header in extra time against Slovakia salvaging their tournament.

When asked about the criticism Southgate has faced, particularly around the team’s tendency to sit back rather than press, the 24-year-old said he feels sorry for the coach.

“The players have got to take some of the blame,” Foden told British media. “There has to be some leaders to get together and find out a solution to why it is not working.

“There is only so much the manager can do. He sets you up in a system and tells you how to press. If it is not going like that, you have to (work it out).”

Foden was named the Premier League’s Player of the Season but has been off the boil in Germany.

“I’ve not been the best player in the Premier League to come here and not show it,” he said.

England take on Switzerland in the quarter-finals on Saturday.

Turkey’s ambassador to Germany has been summoned over a Turkish football player’s “wolf salute” goal celebration, the German foreign ministry said on Thursday, ramping up a diplomatic spat amid reports that Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan will come to Berlin this weekend.

European soccer’s governing body UEFA opened an investigation into the Turkish centre back Merih Demiral’s celebration after scoring in a Tuesday evening European Championship match. Germany condemned the gesture as racist due to its far-right associations.

Turkey’s foreign ministry said UEFA’s probe was unacceptable and that German authorities’ approach to Demiral “involved xenophobia”.

The ministry had summoned Germany’s ambassador to Ankara over the dispute, a Turkish diplomatic source said on Wednesday.

German and Turkish media reported on Thursday that Erdogan now planned to come to Berlin on Saturday for Turkey’s game against the Netherlands.

Erdogan changed his schedule to attend the game, NTV and other Turkish media reported on Thursday.

He was scheduled to attend a summit of Organisation of Turkic States (OTS) in Azerbaijan on Saturday.

The gesture made by the player is linked to the “Grey Wolves”, an ultra-nationalist youth branch of Turkey’s Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), an ally of Erdogan’s ruling AK Party.

The wolf salute is not banned in Germany.

However, German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said on X that “using the European Football Championship as a platform for racism is completely unacceptable.”

Following is the penalty shootout record of the quarter-finalists at Euro 2024. Only shootouts at the World Cup and European Championship have been included.

ENGLAND (won two, lost seven)

1990 World Cup semi-final: Lost 4-3 v West Germany after 1-1 draw

1996 Euros quarter-final: Won 4-2 v Spain after 0-0 draw

1996 Euros semi-final: Lost 6-5 v Germany after 1-1 draw

1998 World Cup last-16: Lost 4-3 v Argentina after 2-2 draw

2004 Euros quarter-final: Lost 6-5 v Portugal after 2-2 draw

2006 World Cup quarter-final: Lost 3-1 v Portugal after 0-0 draw

2012 Euros quarter-final: Lost 4-2 v Italy after 0-0 draw

2018 World Cup last-16: Won 4-3 v Colombia after 1-1 draw

2020 Euros final: Lost 3-2 v Italy after 1-1 draw)

SWITZERLAND (won one, lost three)

2006 World Cup last-16: Lost 3-0 v Ukraine after 0-0 draw

2016 Euros last-16: Lost 5-4 v Poland after 1-1 draw

2020 Euros last-16: Won 5-4 v France after 3-3 draw

2020 Euros quarter-final: Lost 3-2 v Spain after 1-1 draw

2008 Euros quarter-final: Won 3-1 v Croatia after 1-1 draw

The Trent Alexander-Arnold Experiment is dead. Time for another Trent Alexander-Arnold Experiment. Liverpool’s vice-captain seems a misunderstood, underused talent at international level. His time in midfield spanned 123 minutes against Serbia and Denmark and was of sufficient importance, such a scientific voyage of discovery, that it assumed a status of its own. It was an ‘Experiment’.

That it has been deemed a failure was apparent when Gareth Southgate worked his way through a series of partners for Declan Rice against Slovakia – Kobbie Mainoo for craft, Conor Gallagher for graft, Jude Bellingham for overhead kicks – and no scenario called for Alexander-Arnold.

Not as a midfielder anyway. But there felt a pressing need for Alexander-Arnold in his original incarnation, as the right-back revolutionary, the creator supreme, a player with a capacity to make the extraordinary happen.

England have been working on a back three in training ahead of the Euro 2024 quarter-final against Switzerland, with Kyle Walker moved to the right of centre-half and Bukayo Saka potentially playing as a left wingback. Gareth Southgate is now actively considering a formation change, in what could yet be a decisive mid-tournament switch.

The manager had been fretting about how his initial system hadn’t been working in four laboured displays so far but a number of factors have forced him to finally work on something different in the build-up to the Switzerland game.

The primary reason was a required change to the defence anyway, with Marc Guehi suspended after a second booking of the tournament in the 2-1 win over Slovakia.

The playmaker admitted he has been frustrated they haven’t clicked but said that isn’t due to manager Gareth Southgate‘s tactics – rather the players must take responsibility. Foden claims they have felt inhibited due to the nature of matches and defensive opposition approaches but believes the squad need to be more proactive.

While the 24-year-old admitted that he wants to play centrally for England, he denied there is any issue in his own connection with Jude Bellingham, and believes that the performance level is growing.

Euro 2024 is heading to the quarter-finals after an entertaining start to the knockout rounds saw eight more nations exit the tournament.

Spain were the only team to collect the maximum nine points in the group phase and they continued their impressive form with a 4-1 win over Georgia. Switzerland and Germany both progressed to the quarter-finals with 2-0 wins, but it was much harder work for France, England and Portugal who respectively required a late own goal, a very late equaliser/extra-time winner and a penalty shootout to go through.

Here, we assess how every Euro 2024 nation stacks up before the quarter-finals (these rankings are revised after each round of games).

Sometimes in football, the great thinkers are not the great winners. They can show everyone else their ideas, but not their medals. It is why they attract disciples but also dissenters. Ralf Rangnick is the godfather of gegenpressing, but Jurgen Klopp has borrowed from his methods and won the Champions League, league titles in two countries and a host of cups. Some four decades into his managerial career, Rangnick has won the Intertoto Cup, the German Cup, the German second division and the German third tier.

There are managers with bigger trophy cabinets and far less influence. Rangnick’s reputation instead is as a Mitteleuropean Marcelo Bielsa: a pioneer, an evangelist, a man who altered the game but didn’t win the defining matches. For Rangnick, Euro 2024 had promised the belated reward, the historic achievement, the undeniable proof of excellence. He had started to admit that, yes, Austria could win it.

Ezri Konsa will be hoping to get the nod from Gareth Southgate with Marc Guehi suspended for the quarter-final against Switzerland – but his only minutes so far have come at left-back.