As players make their final preparations before the start of a new
season – frantically completing transfer moves, working relentlessly
to ensure maximum fitness, doing endless new-kit photoshoots and daft
Sky Sports walk-out recordings – you wonder to what extent
international football features in their current thoughts. Amidst the
chaos of pre-season and the burning anticipation of the return of the
Premier League, the European Championships must feel a million miles
away…
But naturally, for Gareth Southgate, it will always be at the very
forefront of his mind. Being England manager in the build-up to a
tournament during the domestic season must feel a bit like
living in a continuous anxiety dream: constantly watching events
unfold and essentially being unable to react to them, in any
substantial way at least.
He could, for instance, be highly skeptical of Harry
Maguire’s big-money move to a Manchester United side which has, in
recent years, caused countless top players’ careers either to stagnate
or, worse, fall into complete disarray. Equally, with all of the top
six recruiting wisely (with the exception of the transfer-banned
Chelsea and the already-outstanding Liverpool) and with Everton,
Leicester, West Ham and Wolves all keen to unseat one of the big boys,
he might be disquieted with the highly competitive and inevitably
fatiguing nature of the season which all of the top ten will have to
endure. With the bar in the top half set so high, nearly one in two of
any given team’s games will come against top quality, energy-sapping opposition.
These are some of the more conspicuous points of interest for
Southgate. But the margins of error in international football are so
incredibly fine that every happenstance, however apparently trivial,
could have a knock-on effect on the outcome of the European
Championships next June.
With this campaign, one of the key things England fans are
waiting to discover is whether that elusive creative central midfield
player will emerge. Of the most recent squads, Harry Winks and Declan
Rice show promise (although the latter is often considered more of a
box-to-box midfielder), but can we say either of them have the quality
to cut open top international defences in the nervous intensity of a
Euro 2020 knockout match?
There are three players which fit the ideal profile more closely:
Phil Foden, Marcus Maddison and Mason Mount. Of the trio, Foden looks
the mostly likely to bring that X-Factor. For a young man born in
Stockport, he’s about as un-stereotypically English a footballer as
you could imagine—he exudes creativity, panache and extroversion.
And, as if that wasn’t enough, he has an eye for the killer pass that
England’s centre forwards have been crying out for since the days of
Scholes. Could he be England’s man with the flamethrower in midfield?
It depends what he does this season; or, more accurately, what
Guardiola does with him this season. Time will tell whether his
role will be significant enough with a Manchester City side
featuring some of the best playmakers in the world to warrant giving
him such a pivotal role on the international stage.
Perhaps then, at this stage, Leicester’s James Maddison is a safer
bet. However, while Southgate might be cursing Foden for not moving to
a club where he’ll get more game time, he might be doing the same to
Maddison for not making the step up to a top-six club where he can
take his performances to the next level—there was interest from
Manchester United and Tottenham earlier in the window. Although
playing more consistently, the Leicester City number ten probably has
less of a virtuosic edge than Foden but might be a more risk-free
option in the creative role. With Leicester hoping to push the likes
of Chelsea, Arsenal and United this campaign, you’d guess that the
position is his to lose in the coming months.
There’s also Mason Mount who might be considered something of a
wildcard contender for the spot at the Euros. He’s an unknown quantity
at Premier League level having only played football in Holland and the
Championship so far. But at Derby County under Frank Lampard last
season, he was one of the second tier’s standout players. He now
returns to Chelsea to play under, guess who? Continuing his
development, now in the top flight, under one of the best midfielders
ever to represent England is as big a carrot that could be dangled in
front of a young English player. Mason Mount will be closely monitored by Gareth Southgate.
A lot might depend on the outcome of the Lampard experiment, and
indeed the form of the rest of the top sides. Manchester City,
Liverpool and Spurs all look on track for good, morale-boosting
seasons, but the fate of Arsenal, Manchester United and Chelsea
remains unclear. Despite having a transfer ban, Chelsea have something
of a new-look squad with Tammy Abraham, Mason Mount and Reece James all returning from loan. With Ruben Loftus-Cheek, Ross Barkley and Callum Hudson-Odoi expected to play more significant roles this season, the Chelsea first-team could have a distinctly English flavour. If they perform well, it could be a massive boost for England’s Euro 2020 prospects. The problem is that it’s hard to
judge what would qualify as a successful season for Chelsea this time
around. Surely a top-six finish would suffice, but under the
opaquely ruthless Roman Abramovich, one never knows.
As for Arsenal, yet again they look set to continue to contribute
little to the England team, unless Ainsley Maitland-Niles and Reiss
Nelson have remarkable seasons. It is difficult to see them forcing
their way into first-team contention as they play in two positions
where England already have outstanding options. The fortunes of Ole
Gunnar Solskjær’s United, however, will be pivotal in determining
the makeup of England’s starting 11 come June. While it looks
highly likely that Harry Maguire will feature prominently in
Southgate’s plans, Jesse Lingard, Aaron Wan-Bissaka and Marcus
Rashford will need to be at the top of their game if they are to
usurp the likes of Dele Alli, Trent Alexander-Arnold and Raheem
Sterling.
If the City forward continues his upward trajectory in 2019/20, he
will be England’s most feared player (and perhaps himself the most
likely candidate to be that playmaker); at this moment he is surely
one of the world’s top five, or very close to it. The last team to win
the title three times in a row was Alex Ferguson’s United from 2006 to
2009. It will be fascinating to see if Guardiola can extract the same
level of commitment from Sterling and co again this season. Thus far,
there’s no indication he won’t.
With a focus on things beyond Euro 2020, another engrossing saga
Southgate will follow closely will be Kieran Trippier’s adventures in
Madrid—for established English players thinking of going abroad in
the future, will he be the canary in the mine of the trailblazing
European frontiersman? Of course, he is not the only English player on
foreign soil, but he is the first fully-developed player in recent
years to make the switch. If it’s a success and Trippier fights his
way back into England contention, we could see more senior players
persuaded to swap the comfort of home for more rewarding ventures on
the continent.
Finally, there remains the question of how well-versed players will
be in Southgate’s proposed tactical system by June. Things look
promising in this regard. As is the norm for elite teams in Europe
nowadays, all of the top six play a high press and build from the
back, meaning that English contingents in each of these clubs will be
used not only to playing in this kind of system but also in
playing against it. Furthermore, those chasing the pack are
beginning to play a similar, albeit slightly less expansive, game.
However, it’s in the breaking down of more stubborn opposition that
England’s players might be deprived of experience this season.
Southgate has tended to play a three-at-the-back formation in these
kinds of one-sided affairs in order to dominate possession; this is
something we see more regularly in the Premier League nowadays, but
four at the back is still very much the norm. With a limited amount of
time to tactically drill his players, Southgate must be hoping that,
in 2019/20, his domestic counterparts employ systems which
cross-pollinate with his own.
In the next nine months, the list of potential ‘butterfly effects’
for England is endless. The 2019/20 season – the treacherous route to
the snow-capped mountain that is Euro 2020 – is littered with banana
skins and springboards, snakes and ladders, all in equal measure. We
must hope the gods of football can help us navigate safely through the
minefield that is the coming season.
Adam Williams - Portfolio 