The dust has now settled on the qualification campaign, but that means the build-up forEuro 2020properly ratchets up.
As expected, England breezed through the qualification stages, beating the likes of Montenegro, Bulgaria, Kosovo and the Czech Republic to the top of Group A.
They scored 37 goals in a record-breaking qualification campaign, withHarry Kanetop scoring with 12 – one more than Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo.
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So, beyond being confirmed as seeds for a tournament they will effectively host, where are England at?
What bodes well for the summer, what needs to be worked on for the summer?
What’s looking good …
The scoring
This was something that Gareth Southgate made specific mention of after the win over Montenegro, and seems most special to him. He took real pride in how they regularly ripped teams to shreds, likening it to so many German campaigns.
For Southgate, it seems, this kind of next-level ruthlessness is what really elevates the elite sides. They are certainly next-level figures. England ended the campaign with 37 goals in eight games, making it an average of over 4.6 a match. That is genuinely exceptional, all the more so given the opening spells of games weren’t all that convincing.
It points to something that is really relevant about this record. No matter how England are playing, they just have that capacity – and that number of exciting attacking players – to suddenly rip backlines to shreds. It means they will be alive in any game, against any opposition, no matter how much, say, they’re struggling in position.
This England will always have a chance – because they’re capable of taking any chance. It is related to two other positives…
The development ofRaheem Sterling
One of the reasons the last week’s controversy was all the more pronounced – and almost demanded that severity of punishment – was because of Sterling’s status in the team. He has grown into an influential figure for so many of his teammates, and it is something that has gone alongside his growth as a forward.
It has been as fast his own ability to accelerate. Even in the space of a year and half, Sterling has gone from a brilliant winger, to the kind of all-round forward that pretty much runs a game and a team. He is a true leader in that way, too.
One of his moments of the campaign was in the home game against Kosovo, a Paul Gascoigne-like turn and run that – of course – set up a goal. And you only have to look at his response in Pristina. After a difficult week, and at a genuinely tense moment of the game given it was only 1-0, Sterling supplied two assists.
The expansion of the wide forwards
Sterling leads the way in another manner, and it is an area where England lead the way. He set the trend for this new style of wide forward the country produces, that the current squad produces in abundance.
It genuinely now feels like England’s version of Spain’s passing midfielders, or Uruguay’s center-halves. And it is already known that it is the envy of other big nations, since so many German clubs have been trying to sign players like Callum Hudson-Odoi to plug blind spots in their own development structures.
The Chelsea winger is of course just another flying forward fighting for a place alongside Sterling with Marcus Rashford and Jadon Sancho. You could even add Ross Barkley, Mason Mount and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain as modern mobile forwards, if not quite blessed with the pace of their wide teammates.
It is still a potential, however, that gives England such attacking thrust. In Southgate’s words, they possess the “speed, movement, speed of ball circulation” to “carves those teams apart”.
Team solidity
This applies to both the spirit of the team, and the structure. One of the reasons that Southgate felt the need to punish Sterling in the first place was because he couldn’t allow his most influential player to so break from the harmonious atmosphere he has worked hard to engender. And that atmosphere has stayed intact at the end of this campaign, ironically strengthened by the whole incident due to players rallying around Joe Gomez after he was booed at Wembley.
It means that, at least psychologically, there are links and a level of cohesion to the whole squad.
That will help deepening the links in how the team works, although they’re not quite there yet. Work needs to be done. What is key, however, is that this campaign has at least allowed Southgate to settle on his best formation. He is now clear it must be a 4-3-3, all the more so because of the abundance of wide forwards. He just needs to solve some other issues within it…
What needs to be worked on
The central midfield issue
One problem still hasn’t gone away, and actually only became more pronounced in the middle of the campaign when England lost to Netherlands in the Nations League. It’s in some ways an unsolvable problem in the short-term. England still don’t really have a player like Frenkie de Jong, like Luka Modric, like Thiago Alcantara. They don’t have that key midfielder who puts his foot on the ball, and dictates possession and effectively the way the entire team plays.
It remains a very big problem, given how integral it is to how international football works. And, while it remains, it feels like England are going to need a lot of luck – or maybe just a lot of breaks to run – in any big game against big opposition. Because they just won’t have the same control of the ball, or thereby the game.
Declan Rice isn’t really a midfielder in that regard. Harry Winks is good but is more someone to be set alongside such a player. It does still seem like Southgate is going to have to come up with something creative to get around it, which leads to the next issue…
The arrangement of that central midfield
In the eight different games of this campaign, Southgate has started with seven different midfield combinations, which points to the issue that it’s still difficult to know what the best combination is. The problem is not the one in central defense, where it is like the quality or form of potential partners for Harry Maguire has dropped it off. It is actually that there is a significant amount of quality, but it’s difficult to now how to arrange it to maximise the abilities there and cover for some of the weaknesses.
It is possible we may not have even seen the best yet, which currently feels – in terms of balance, and different qualities – Winks, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Jordan Henderson. Or maybe play James Maddison that bit further back? This is one of many questions Southgate has to work out, to get around the problem of other big countries moving the ball around better.
The “sloppy goals”
This is admittedly something that is connected to possession and control of the game, but it’s equally impossible to avoid the issue that England do look that bit less solid at the back.
They’ve been giving up more chances, and can very suddenly look very open. Part of that is that drop-off among the center-halves, but with Southgate insisting they won’t now deviate from the 4-3-3 to cover it, it is a problem that must be solved. Can Tyrone Mings grow? Should Rice actually be put there? Can Fikayo Timori grow into such a role?
It remains that missing part, that least covered area – leading to more sloppy moments.
Set-pieces
A separate issue to the sloppiness but equally indicative. England have suddenly looked that bit more susceptible from dead balls. It is at the least something Southgate and his staff can most easily work on, and really just takes the rigor that pre-tournament preparation should allow.
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