GOT your tickets booked to London for England’s open-top bus parade on July 15?
Maybe hold fire for a few weeks.
At Newcastle’s St James’ Park, Gareth Southgate’s team delivered a generally uninspiring performance – apart from a couple of late goals – in the first of their two warm-up matches.
Cole Palmer, starting his first England game, scored from the penalty spot although the only moment of real quality came through Trent Alexander-Arnold’s terrific volley for 2-0. Substitute Harry Kane grabbed his 63rd goal at the end.
Although Euro 2024 fever has yet to sweep through the country, England’s first game against Serbia at Gelsenkirchen is just 12 days away.
So let’s hope Friday’s second warm-up against Iceland is better over 90 minutes than this one.
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Obviously, it is ridiculously early to write off England’s chances of being victorious in Berlin on July 14.
Yet this merely illustrated that the team’s strength in depth is not as brilliant as some would have you believe. Some of Southgate’s B-team failed to take their opportunities.
There was a bright first performance for Eberechi Eze although he failed to deliver any real damage.
Ollie Watkins, scorer of 27 goals for Aston Villa this season, rarely got a sniff before being replaced.
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Marc Guehi and Lewis Dunk were in central defence but they were not really tested. And there was also another trial in central midfield for Trent Alexander-Arnold and hopefully, he will get another run-out next to Declan Rice on Friday.
When Southgate made his five subs after the goal , Jarrad Branthwaite and Adam Wharton were handed their debuts which meant Alexander-Arnold moved to right-back – but he still got forward to deliver a terrific finish for his third goal for England.
Jarrod Bowen did okay while Jack Grealish, having played just 10 minutes for Manchester City in their final five games, got a 30-minute run-out. He did well and set-up Alexander-Arnold with a clever pass. He needs to do the same against Iceland to ensure he heads to Germany.
That appearance off the bench for Kane was his first game since Bayern Munich’s semi-final loss to Real Madrid, when he was already struggling with a back problem, so at least he seems fine.
In fairness to Southgate, he has been handed all sorts of selection issues.
He had to give a few days extra rest to those who played in the FA Cup final while European champion Jude Bellingham will not return to training until Saturday. And then there are the fitness problems for both Luke Shaw and Harry Maguire.
It needs to be stressed that performances in these warm-up matches are not an accurate indicator of how a team will perform.
Ahead of the previous summer tournament, Euro 2020 three years ago, which saw England reach the final, they struggled to unconvincing 1-0 wins over Romania and Austria, with both games played up here in the north-east at Middlesbrough.
Two years earlier, before the World Cup in Russia, England did not look like a team that would ultimately reach the semi-finals when struggling past Nigeria 2-1 at Wembley and seeing off Costa Rica 2-0 in Leeds.
Ahead of Euro 2016, England beat Portugal in a warm-up at Wembley. One team got knocked out by Iceland and the other one returned from France with the winners’ trophy
Despite Bosnia being ranked 74 in the world, England struggled to cause them many problems.
Watkins, looking to continue his outstanding season, forced an early block from keeper Nikola Vasilj. Palmer had created that chance for Watkins and then from one of his corners, the Villa striker steered a header straight at the keeper.
Bosnia’s only chance came following a sloppy pass from Guehi but Haris Hajradinovic’s shot deflected off Alexander-Arnold for a corner.
England were better in the second half but they could not have got any worse.
After a Bowen shot was deflected for a corner, VAR spotted that Konsa was having his shirt tugged by Benjamin Tahirovic and after consulting the screen, Norwegian referee Rohut Saggi awarded a penalty.
Palmer’s strike was not great but it was still enough to beat Vasilj. Alexander-Arnold then drilled his shot into the corner before Kane pounced after Bowen’s shot hit Konsa.
Within an hour of the final whistle, Southgate and his squad will hurry off to Newcastle’s airport for a flight to Southend.
From there, they will head to the accommodation at Tottenham’s training ground which will be their base ahead of Friday’s second warm-up friendly against Iceland.
It is after that game where Southgate will deliver the news to seven players that they will not be heading to Germany.
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After being given Saturday off to spend time with their families, the 26-man squad will meet at St George’s Park on Sunday before flying to Germany on Monday. They will stay at a remote base near Blankenhain.
Hopefully, Southgate and his squad will be away for just under five weeks. But there is a hell of a lot of work to do.
Source: Soccer - thesun.co.uk
