Southgate states where blame lays after Hungarian children boo England’s anti-racism gesture

England manager Gareth Southgate

Gareth Southgate blamed the adults in attendance for influencing thousands of Hungarian children to boo England’s anti-racism gesture in Budapest.

England began their UEFA Nations League campaign with a dismal 1-0 defeat in Hungary. The Three Lions barely got going in the first half and were lucky not to fall behind to an audacious 50-yard lob that had Jordan Pickford worried.

Jarrod Bowen looked the liveliest of England’s forwards throughout the contest, though neither he or suibstitute Bukayo Saka could make a dent in Hungary’s defence.

With the game meandering, Reece James conceded a penalty mid-way through the second half that looked soft in real time and upon reflection.

Dominik Szoboszlai kept his cool from the spot, tucking past Pickford to make it 1-0.

Any hopes of a late England fightback went by the wayside with a whimper. Conor Coady came closest of all with a glanced header, though it wasn’t to be with Southgate’s side rarely getting out of second gear all evening.

MATCH REPORT: Lacklustre England beaten in Hungary with Reece James punished by dubious decision

The most newsworthy incident arising from the match was the fact the crowd – made up largely of Hungarian children of school age – booed England’s collective taking of the knee at kick-off.

The match had initially been ruled to be played behind closed doors as punishment for Hungarian fans racially abusing England’s black players during their clash at Wembley in 2021.

However, an alteration was agreed that allowed tens of thousands of children to attend while accompanied by adults.

Speaking to Channel 4 after the match, Southgate said: “The first thing, that (taking the knee) is why we do it, to try to educate people around the world.”

Putting the blame squarely on the adults influencing the younger fans in attendance, Southgate added: “I have no idea why people would choose to boo the gesture. The young people can’t know why they are doing it so they are being influenced by older adults.

“The UEFA decision (allowing children and accompanying adults to attend) is for other people to decide.

“We have made our stand as a team, everyone knows what we believe in and stand for, it is a night where I need to focus on the football.”

Southgate questions whether he got big decisions right

Regarding England’s defeat on the pitch, Southgate added: “We have to accept that we did not do enough to win the game, a draw would have been the fair outcome.

“We did not create too many clear cut chances and the actual result hinged on a decision which is harsh but probably won’t be overturned.

“Once it has been given as a penalty, he probably will not overturn it. You see challenges like that in the box, Reece James puts his body between the ball and the forward makes a meal of it. Away from home sometimes you will get those calls.

England defender Reece James after conceding a penalty against Hungary

“It has (been a long season) the heat was a factor and took a lot out of the players and we tried to refresh the team earlier than normal. The balance of finding out about new things and the consistency of the regular team, I have to look at whether I got that right.

“I don’t want to be too harsh on them, these are games where we need to learn from. They are bitterly disappointed because we want to keep winning matches. If we want to be a team right at the top tier of football, we need to come here and win.”

On facing Germany on Tuesday: “We have to go and see how everybody has come through physically, there are players we tried to keep out of the game to refresh the team for Germany. That is now a bigger game.

“We want those challenges, we know we have a good team with some steps still to go and learned about some individual players and learned about different tactical challenges. I have to make sure I keep the players on track.”

Coady urges England to learn lessons

England defender Coady also spoke to Channel 4, saying: “We’ve got a massive game on coming up on Tuesday [versus Germany]. We need to look at this performance and learn from it very quickly.

“I thought we started off quite well. We need to tidy up and bounce back. We need to look at how we performed and how we move forward because these are big games for us.

“We have lost and it’s important we look at ourselves.”

On the suspect James penalty call, Coady admitted: “I think we were all a little bit shocked at first. It was one of those where no one appealed for a penalty.”