The Fan

Who’s running the England team?

The Editor — Mon, October 9th 2006

Venables to push for his favoured 5 man midfield

Newspapers having been reporting with increasing frequency that England are to start playing a 3-5-2 formation for their Euro qualifier against Croatia. England’s players don’t seem to want it, and coach McClaren seems happier with a 4-4-2. Is Terry Venables finally getting his way?

Last week it was reported that player power stopped England reverting to 3-5-2 against Macedonia, but Saturday’s poor performance and McClaren’s need to look in charge might be the straw that broke the camel’s back, and McClaren’s number two Terry Venables’ cherished five-man midfield seems likely to be pressed into action.

How the extra man in the middle will benefit is unclear. Presumably Ashley Cole will play left midfield as Cole’s performances have been one of England’s brighter aspects, and Downing has been poor. England have lacked creativity for years now, relying on Rooney or Gerrard to produce the team’s moments of magic. The extra man in the middle would ideally be a creative player but England don’t have one - Carrick has yet to look anything like international quality.

England’s strength is to get wide with wingers like Wright-Philips, but without overlapping full-backs there strengths could be easily negated and could find themselves defending too much.

England’s world class midfield shouldn’t need a fifth man as back up. If they are to play 5 in midfield then maybe Rooney should drop in just behind a front 2 of Crouch and some one else (Defoe?).

Listed in: Competitions, Euro Championship, Countries, England

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