England’s hopes of winning the Euros for the first time took a nose dive in London.
Manchester United defender Luke Shaw had given Southgate’s men the lead just two minutes into the game, but the Azzurri replied midway through the second half through Leonardo Bonucci to take the game into extra time.
Both teams failed to create any goalscoring opportunity in the extra 30 minutes and the penalty shootout remained the only way to split England and Italy.
It ended in a big disappointment for the Englishmen and Southgate has taken full responsibility for his side’s defeat.
“We are hugely disappointed of course, I think firstly the players have been an absolute credit, they have given everything they possibly could,” Southgate told BBC Sport.
“It was exactly the same [in the final], they have run themselves into the ground. At times they played really well, at times we didn’t really keep the ball quite well enough.
“Especially at the start of the second half. But they can’t have recriminations. They have been an absolute joy to work with and they have gone further than we’ve gone for so long. But of course tonight it is incredibly painful in that dressing room.”
Southgate brought on Jadon Sancho and Marcus Rashford in the final minutes of the game to take penalties and both saw their effort saved together with other team-mate Bukayo Saka.
The English coach added: “That is it is down to me, I decided on the penalty takers based on what they have done in training and nobody is on their own.
“We have won together as a team and it is on all of us together to not be able to win the game tonight and in terms of penalties it is my call and it totally rests with me.
“We were well prepared and we started it well, unfortunately we weren’t able to convert.
“They can’t look at themselves in terms of how they practice because they couldn’t have done that anymore or any better.”
