Dave Kidd: England’s win over Netherlands was good news for Gareth Southgate’s three-man defence… but let’s not get carried away just yet
Three Lions put in a confident showing against the Netherlands and secured a 1-0 win thanks to goal from Jesse Lingard
WE certainly aren’t going to get carried away by this.
In the same international break two years ago, before their Euro 2016 humiliation by Iceland, England were coming from two goals down to defeat world champions Germany in Berlin.
This was a first victory over Holland since the epic 4-1 thrashing at Euro 96 but beating such a pitiful Dutch team hardly merits mentioning in the same breath as that.
Yet here’s the thing: despite all the negativity and downright apathy which surrounds international breaks in England, the Three Lions have found an intelligent, imaginative manager with a decent game plan.
Five at the back, three central defenders all comfortable bringing the ball out, and a couple of flying wing-backs capable of pinging in a decent cross.
And when Gareth Southgate talks about English footballers enjoying the chance to express themselves and having absolute belief in their own ability, his words have some substance.
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When Southgate put out his teamsheet last night, it had looked plain weird.
It was noted that England were starting with five right-backs and two others capable of playing in that position.
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Kieran Trippier, Kyle Walker and Joe Gomez for sure. John Stones had started his professional career as one. Chelsea tried to sign Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain from Arsenal as one.
Jesse Lingard filled in there at Crystal Palace earlier this month and Jordan Henderson has done so in the past.
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Yet despite all the ridiculing of Southgate’s right-back fixation, the team ticked nicely.
Employing Walker on the right of a central defensive three was a decent move – the former Tottenham man has improved as an all-round footballer under Pep Guardiola at Manchester City and he looked more than comfortable.
Southgate says the versatility of Walker and Eric Dier, who will face Italy on Tuesday, will allow him to choose more attacking players in his 23-man squad for Russia.
Alongside Walker, his club-mate Stones was in full Barnsley Beckenbauer mode – despite having been ditched from Guardiola’s first-choice eleven of late.
Gomez started off as the third man, but limped off early on and his replacement Harry Maguire was lumpier on the ball, although Southgate is convinced by the Leicester man.
For the opening hour, England played some very neat football in their own half. In and around their opponents’ box, not so much.
Lingard’s sharp strike, after a Rose cross cannoned off a Dutch defender, gave England the victory they deserved.
But more important than the result is the fact England have a style of a play and a comfort in possession which suggests they are being well coached by Southgate and right-hand man Steve Holland.
Add a world-class centre-forward in Harry Kane to last night’s side and you could imagine England at least avoiding their usual major-tournament embarrassment.
They are not world-beaters. Nowhere near.
England don’t have enough good players, playing regular enough first-team football at major clubs for that.
And Southgate, like most England managers, has to wrestle with the fact that from one international break to the next, the same players rarely seem to be fit and in form for their clubs.
But at least with a joined-up plan of the possession football England want to play, individuals can come and go.
That’s the theory – and England now have five clean sheets in a row to suggest it’s working.
That run reads one-nil, one-nil, nil-nil, nil-nil, one-nil. It’s hardly thrilling but it suggests a basic level of competence.
Of course, it will be very different when they face the world’s elite in competitive action – starting with Belgium in their final World Cup group match in June.
But Southgate is one FA employee who certainly knows what he is doing – and the governing body need to be thankful for that.
Whichever dunderhead rubber-stamped a Friday night trip to Amsterdam for England’s last pre-World Cup trip – and the smart money is usually on chief executive Martin Glenn – was asking for trouble.
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As Deputy Chief Constable Mark Roberts, head of the UK Football Policing Unit, said: “Other than playing Scotland in Magaluf or Russia in Marseilles, it's hard to think of a worse place to play the last away friendly before the World Cup.”
As in Dortmund a year ago, a sizeable minority of England’s support – ASBO candidates with a weird fixation about the Second World War - bored and intimidated their hosts.
Ninety had been detained by Dutch police before kick-off last night after one of the doziest pieces of fixture-planning in living memory.
At least the FA have a decent, articulate manager who is more diplomatic than the foreign secretary.
As for managing a football team, well as long as your expectations are realistic, he is also doing a decent job.
Marcus Rashford was denied a clear penalty and Trippier had a rasping shot pushed out by Jeroen Zoet, either side of Lingard’s goal.
It might have been an excellent night had those chances been converted. As it was, this was more steady progress.
And if England do end up losing the plot in Russia, at least we’ll know there was a plot to lose in the first place.