England won't be as gung-ho as we thought at Euro 2016 after forward formation disappoints vs Portugal

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James Olley3 June 2016

As Roy Hodgson walked out of a press briefing on the eve of this match, he offered these prescient words in response to a parting question about which system England would play.

“Formations don’t win you games, players do.

“The quality of the 11 individuals…if they were any good they would sort a few formations out for themselves during the course of the game.”

This performance against Portugal suggests they need a little more guidance.

England flitted between a 4-4-2 diamond and 4-3-3 in their first two warm-up matches against Turkey and Australia yet here they persisted with the former despite an underwhelming display and the introduction of five second half substitutes.

Portugal did their level best to ensure the test they represented here was dramatically removed from the one originally devised by the Football Association when organising this fixture; by resting Cristiano Ronaldo and then being reduced to ten men after Bruno Alves’ idiotic red card for attempting to decapitate Harry Kane, England were suddenly posed a very different challenge.

It was not one they rose to despite Chris Smalling’s 86th-minute winner and Hodgson’s protestations that England “dominated the ball” and played good football at times.

Player Ratings: How England performed in their Euro 2016 warm-up matches

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Portugal’s transitory state rendered this less of a learning exercise than it otherwise might have been but still it ranks as a disappointment that England’s attacking players could not muster more of a show than this.

The excitement generated by Hodgson’s attacking squad selection did not manifest itself despite the deployment of Wayne Rooney in his most logical position – as a No10 behind two strikers – and the inclusion of Harry Kane and Jamie Vardy, scorers of 49 Premier League goals between them last season.

Hodgson explicitly stated in reference to Kane and Vardy after England beat Australia that “we don’t want them to play together – we want split strikers and that is what we need to do consistent work on.” That work is very much incomplete.

Kane pulled wide to better effect than Vardy, who was peripheral in a role which seemed to nullify many of his principal attacking threats.

Both were asked to perform a considerable amount of defensive work as Hodgson clearly indicated afterwards: “When you play that system, you need your strikers to split. If you play with duo down the middle and Rooney in behind them, you won’t be able to defend the wide areas.”

Perhaps England are not going to be quite as gung-ho as we imagined. Hodgson may regularly espouse the belief that players win matches rather than formations but he must be wary of insisting on instructions that do not necessarily play to the strengths of those individuals.

Kane and Vardy did not light up the Premier League because of their willingness to drop in as wide players without possession. Too often they were too far apart when England did have the ball.

“If you show me back some moments in the game, you might be right and there might have been moments when they were too wide but basically speaking, it would have to be their job that they make certain they split and also come together,” said Hodgson. “If we play with a man in behind them, he has to make certain he gets forward and supports the attack.”

If England are to persist with the diamond formation – and every indication is they will – then there must be greater tempo and incision from their midfielders to provide the requisite service Kane and co need to thrive.

Jack Wilshere provided a few signs of that sharper passing in a second half cameo when replacing the ineffective James Milner but on a night when we hoped to see a degree of fine-tuning from two uneven displays, this was in fact more of the same.

“The players have been excellent in terms of the way they have buckled down to try and improve the shape of our team, the movement in attack and our shape in defence,” insisted Hodgson.

“I am happy that we are definitely on the right track as far as that is concerned. We will go to France reasonably confident that we can keep this going but also knowing full well that we are not the finished article - I don’t know how many teams actually are.

"But that is also quite a good thing because had we won all three games 4-0, all people would be saying is ‘well, you’ve got to win it’. With a young team, that would have put too much pressure on us.”

That is one way of looking at it. England’s players now have a couple of days off before reconvening on Sunday evening ahead of their flight to Chantilly.

There is plenty for Hodgson to ponder and still time for this England team to fire but further progress is required if England are to emerge from next Saturday’s opening Group B game against Russia with a result to hit the ground running.

Individual performance is palpably important but only by constructing the team in the right way will Hodgson ensure England become more than the sum of their parts.

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