I hate the idea of playing with TWO holding midfielders

ENGLAND don’t excite me. We play no-risk football with so-called holding midfielders intent on keeping possession, but we don’t hurt teams. We’ve got dynamic young players with pace. Let’s use them, increase the tempo and get short, sharp passes into dangerous areas. I hate the phrase ‘holding midfielder’. It implies the player doesn’t have licence to do anything other than stay in a small area of the pitch and protect his defence — and we’re using two of them against teams like Slovenia. Bryan Robson was the most dynamic midfielder of his generation. He broke the play up, won the ball, then drove forward. All midfielders should have those disciplines in their make-up, that’s what the position is about. When I played alongside Paul Bracewell at Everton, as he went forward I sat in behind. You had your mate’s back. If he goes, you fill in. If Jordan Henderson or Eric Dier see a chance to go forward, they have to take it. I got taught that at school, there’s no fantastic science to it. Yet we have players cautious of stepping forward. I’m not sure if the players are afraid, or the coaching staff are. Don’t get me wrong, if you are playing Spain or Germany, teams who can hurt you on the counter-attack, then I understand a cautious set-up. But against other teams there’s no excuse: go for the jugular. There’s an apathy in the stands because England don’t excite the supporters. Throughout the age groups, from Under 16s to the seniors, we want this DNA, based on possession, but we’ve lost the point of it. How many games have we seen England dominate but still labour to score? Can we say we’ve improved since the Iceland debacle? The true barometer will be when we play to our strengths, attack and beat teams in the World Cup finals. Adam Lallana and Dele Alli will make a difference. They give creativity and a real edge. And we have players such as Raheem Sterling and Marcus Rashford who can terrify the best defences, but we don’t utilise their strengths. Encourage them to take people on, pick up the pace of our passing, use one-twos and play the ball into the gaps in the box for them to run on to. Only go square when you can’t go forward. Take a calculated risk. We have a good nucleus of young players who can be dynamic, but we need to let them play. lCheer Up Peter Reid: My Autobiography is available now.