GARETH’S KINGS OF SPAIN
Sensational Sterling leads English charge on an incredible night
RAHEEM STERLING broke his goalscoring drought in spectacular fashion last night as England’s youngest starting XI since 1959 recorded the country’s best result since beating Germany away in 2001.
Gareth Southgate’s side won in Spain thanks to three first-half goals — two of them from a man who hadn’t scored for the Three Lions since October 2015 — and a performance that was by turns brave, brilliant, fraught and downright manic.
Marcus Rashford also scored in between’s Sterling’s double, while goalkeeper Jordan Pickford went from being the architect of two goals to almost getting sent off.
Spain so very nearly snatched a point in the second half as England clung on, but goals from Paco Alcacer and Sergio Ramos proved mere consolations in the end.
‘It was a beautiful feeling,’ said Sterling. ‘I put a lot of pressure on myself to get into the box and try to score goals. Sometimes it works for you, sometimes it doesn’t but I’m in the position to score goals and I need to keep that going.
‘It means a lot to me. It is three years since I last scored and it means a lot in a game like this.
‘It was a brilliant team performance. I thought we went straight at them from the beginning and we were clinical.’
This was a wonderful match. The UEFA Nations League has flaws aplenty, but anyone who thinks England won because Spain weren’t bothered can’t have seen the game.
They certainly looked bothered when Alcacer headed in Marco Asensio’s corner in the 58th minute and the partisan Andalusian crowd thought they could get back in it.
They certainly seemed keen when furious players surrounded referee Szymon Marciniak of Poland, demanding a penalty after Pickford had clambered all over Rodrigo retrieving a horrid mistake.
Initially, he got caught in possession. He compounded it by trying to escape with a Cruyff turn inside his own penalty area. Such things rarely end well and this was no exception.
Pickford lost the ball, Rodrigo shaped for an easy goal, Pickford climbed all over him to prevent it, succeeding in knocking the ball out for a corner.
It looked like a penalty, it should have been a penalty, it wasn’t a penalty. Spain went bananas.
Yet, somehow, England held firm. Joe Gomez and Harry Maguire were not flawless, but steadfast. The work of the midfield was outstanding. The full-backs were tireless.
And before their backs-to-thewall finale, England showed sensational counter-attacking smarts to race to a 3-0 half-time lead. Here was Southgate’s revolution in action.
An extraordinarily young team, playing enterprising, intelligent football against one of the best teams in the world — away.
He has even, at last, brought the best out of Sterling. Even taking into account England’s exploits at the World Cup, this was the high-water mark of Southgate’s era.
This is what he has been working towards for two years now.
England wait three years for a Sterling goal and then two come along at once. Old joke, sure, but who can resist it in the circumstances?
It was October 9, 2015, when he last scored for his country, against Estonia. His previous and only other goal had come against Lithuania. It was a lousy return for a player who scores for fun in a Manchester City shirt these days.
But this was no mere kick up the Baltics. Two goals, in Spain, before half-time. That is the level of excellence demanded of Sterling since he emerged in the build-up to the 2014 World Cup.
Perhaps this game will prove a turning point for him in an England shirt.
What a goal the first was. A supreme counter-attack, England moving the ball from back to front at a pace and precision that startled their opponents.
Pickford started the moves for England’s first two goals. These were not punts upfield that needed to be contested and won by a big man. These were passes of the kind a deep playmaker might hit — identifying a man and picking him out with precision.
Pickford spotted Harry Kane in a good position and pinged it, but with purpose. The Tottenham man then moved it on in a way that carved Spain wide open.
Kane hasn’t been scoring of late — six games without a goal coming to Seville. Yet his passing is the most under-rated aspect of his game.
He gets compared to great England goalscorers of recent times like Alan Shearer, but Shearer couldn’t have operated as a No 10, nor would he have wanted to. Kane could and might, one day. He can pick a pass as expertly as any forward in the game.
That is what he did after 16 minutes, finding Rashford who streaked through before knocking the final pass of the move to Sterling.
Finishing is his weak point, apparently. Not here. He absolutely leathered the ball past David de Gea, with the confidence he displays each week for City. What a goal, what a start for England.
Only 13 minutes later the second came, with many similar
features. Again it began with an outstanding pass across two thirds of the field from Pickford, again Kane was the target, again his support work exemplary.
This time it was an exquisite reverse pass that put Rashford through one on one.
He had squandered the best chances of the game in the 0-0 draw in Croatia last Friday night, and that hardly inspired confidence, but what a transformation.
Maybe going up against his Manchester United team-mate De Gea made it feel like a training exercise. Rashford tucked the ball away, the locals sat, stunned.
Spain have only lost one match in this stadium and that was in 1991. But with six minutes to go before half-time, Ross Barkley played a beautiful chip to the far post that caught Spain by surprise once more.
Kane was there and clipped it back for Sterling arriving in the six-yard box with perfect timing. In 38 minutes, he had doubled his goal tally for England.
England knew Spain would come after them in the second half and so it proved, with the night getting jittery for the visitors once Alcacer reduced the deficit in the 58th minute.
But they held firm and Ramos’ header at the death was a case of too little, too late. SPAIN (4-3-3): De Gea 5; Jonny 6, Nacho 5, Ramos 6, Marcos Alonso 5; Thiago Alcantara 8, Busquets 7, Saul 6 (Alcacer 57); Iago Aspas 6 (Ceballos 57), Rodrigo Moreno 5 (Morata 72), Marcos Asensio 6. Subs not used: Albiol, Koke, Fernández Saez, Arrizabalaga Azpilicueta, Hernández, Gayá, Bartra, López. Booked: Ramos, Ceballos, Otto, Morata. ENGLAND (4-3-3): Pickford 7; Trippier 7 (Alexander-Arnold 84), Gomez 7, Maguire 7, Chilwell 7; Barkley (Walker 76), Dier 8, Winks 8 (Chalobah 90); Sterling 9, Kane 8, Rashford 8. Subs not used: Butland, Dunk, Mount, Maddison, Sancho, Bettinelli. Booked: Maguire, Dier, Winks. Man of the match: Raheem Sterling. Referee: Szymon Marciniak (Poland).