It’s coming home! Kane has got the Golden Boot! Gareth Southgate is the best football manager ever! Bla bla bla.. I am glad the World Cup is over so there will not be any more hysterical admiration of England and their young head coach. Don’t get me wrong, I love Premier League. I like a couple of English players. Gareth Southgate has done the best he could to make England decent again. I am not blind to realize this group of players and coaches are an improvement on the one we have seen in France, Brazil and for the past decade or so.

But they were decent at best! What exactly they did on football pitch to be called title contenders? Let’s trace their route to the semifinal of the World Cup.

It all started with Qualification campaign where England picked up 26 points out of 30. Sounds great but look at the opposition: Slovakia, Scotland, Slovenia, Lithuania and Malta. Seriously, anything less than 26 points would be a disaster for any team considering themselves football elite. I am not sure all English fans or players would be able to pin all of those rivals on the map. Despite that, Iceland were the only group winner that scored fewer goals than England in Qualification campaign.

At the World Cup, England were drawn with Tunisia, Panama and Belgium. They scraped past Tunisia, getting all three points courtesy of late Harry Kane effort, beat tournament first timers and hardly a competitive team in Panama and lost to second string Belgium side. It is highly possible that Gareth Southgate chose to lose to avoid potential fixtures with Brazil or France in the next stages of the tournament but Belgium were in the same position and opted to win the game regardless.

Then came Colombia without their main star player James Rodriguez. England won in penalty shootout by one-goal margin.

In the quarterfinals The Three Lions beat Sweden who clearly jumped above their heads when they made it to the last eight. And that was pretty much it for England-it’s-coming-home.

Croatia were simply stronger and looked like a Team in the semifinal clash. England made just 1 (ONE!) shot on target in 120 minutes. That was the end of the British dream.

England could have finished the tournament on a positive and bring bronze medals back home but faced Belgium in the third-place playoff. Once again, Belgium proved to be a better team.

So what exactly was there to cheer about? England won four games, including one in penalty shootout and lost three. Is that something to be proud of?

Harry Kane won the Golden Boot but three of those goals were penalty strikes. Three goals were scored in the game against Panama. Is that a world-class striker performance?

The vast majority of England goals came from set pieces. A goal is always a goal but we love combinations, too. England finished just 3% of their counterattacks with shots. Basically, it’s not clear if Gareth Southgate taught that group anything but set pieces.

So what exactly was so great about that England team apart from the hype?