ENGLAND ARE ALL SYSTEMS GO
Delph says late arrival of Champions League Seven is no problem and insists…
THE Subtle Art Of Not Giving A F**k has made its way into the England dressing room this week and a book that encourages the reader to embrace reality is perhaps proving useful.
This, after all, is a far from ideal week for Gareth Southgate and his players. A week when their preparation for the Nations League finals has been severely disrupted by the success English clubs have enjoyed in Europe. A week that gives them just two full days together, and two proper training sessions, before they meet Virgil van Dijk and his Dutch colleagues in Guimaraes.
It might well be a case of too little too late, but Fabian Delph, the player who confessed to being bought the self-help manual by his wife because he probably needs to chill out a bit, does seem fairly relaxed.
Has it been chaotic? ‘ From the outside it does look that way,’ he says as he reflects on a training camp when they have had ‘ 13 players one day, 17 the next’.
‘ But we’ve been planning diligently. We’ve been watching a lot of clips on Holland, we’ve been working hard in training, we know what we need to know. We know the systems that we might need to play or adapt to.
‘So although from the outside it looks like, “Bloody hell, where is everyone?” I think we’ve got a squad with lads who are quite intelligent. They’re very professional, especially for such a young team, so we’ll be totally fine.’
The players, says Delph as a member of Southgate’s leadership team, are programmed to cope with such challenges. ‘ Since the World Cup we’ve gone with the same system and we have the same routines,’ said Delph. ‘ Everybody knows whether it’s the A, B or C system that we play, we know how to adapt. I don’t think the preparation has been as bad as it looks from the outside. I did think that coming into it — “Wow, there’s going to be nobody there” — but it’s been good.’
Credit, says Delph, has to go to the manager and the coaches. ‘Gareth has got a great way about him,’ he says. ‘But it’s not just Gareth. It’s the staff who he’s got with him. The backroom staff, the guys in the background that nobody really sees, they’re really good people.
‘When you come here, straight away you feel if they tell you to run through a brick wall
you’re going to run through the brick wall. You want to do everything you can for these people. ‘Everybody is buying into what Gareth is putting on the training pitch and in the meeting rooms. Everybody is buying into it and heading in the same direction.’ It remains to be seen how well the seven players involved in Saturday’s Champions League final make the rapid transition from the world’s biggest club game to an international semi- final. Delph makes the point, quite rightly, that both the Dutch and the English sides should benefit from the quality those players in action in Madrid possess. But Delph also draws confidence from closer to home, from the young player who joined him in signing for Manchester City in the summer of 2015.
Delph has been a friend, teammate and mentor to Raheem Sterling and he regards a forward who will earn his 50th cap tomorrow as someone who can ensure England maintain their more recent high standards, however problematic the build-up.
As the other winner of an individual player’s award in England this season, Sterling might even provide the solution to conquering the seemingly indomitable Van Dijk.
‘He’s an amazing young man,’ says Delph of Sterling. ‘People forget he’s still only 24. When we both signed, he was 19 and he looked like a little baby.
‘People would always question what type of player he’d be and whether he’d go to the next level, but I was like, “This kid has everything”. I knew that once he found his path and what worked for him, we were going to see something incredible.’
Delph, however, thinks there is still plenty to come. ‘I believe he’s operating at about 80 per cent,’ he says. ‘If he can push himself a little more, the sky’s the limit over the next couple of years. He’s always had the mindset to believe he can become one of the best players in the world.
‘In fact, he’s got the strongest mindset I’ve ever come across in football. Vincent Kompany is another one, he is very strong mentally. But nothing fazes Raheem. He’s very confident in himself and very dedicated to his craft.’
Delph says he speaks ‘as someone who has known Raheem since he was 19’. ‘I’ve seen his progression,’ he says. ‘And while I’m still with him, or while I’m still in contact with him, I’m going to be pushing him daily because I know he’s got another 20 per cent in him.
‘I’m more experienced. I’ll give him pats on the back, motivating him, giving him good advice and telling him to be confident.
‘ But when I played for the national team in November he was doing that to me, pumping me up. For the last four or five years he’s never questioned himself and I’ve never questioned him.’
Listening to Delph, you can see why Southgate continues to select a player whose first-team opportunities are relatively limited at City. The 29-year-old is a powerful voice in the dressing room, and someone even players of Sterling’s stature listen to.
Talking to the BBC, Steve Holland said Delph offers a variety of important qualities.
‘If we go back to qualifying from the Nations League, to November and the Croatia game at home, Fabian was arguably our best player in that game,’ said Southgate’s assistant. ‘He is a player who can cover full back or he can play in any position in midfield.
‘And he’s a player with athleticism, leadership and quality. Frankly, if he had been at any other club in England he would have been playing much more frequently. But he is a player we can trust.’
Not to mention someone who travels with interesting reading material.