Rice & Phillips have been key... but England will need more to unlock stubborn defences

A LOT will be made about the performances of John Stones, Harry Maguire and, before him, Tyrone Mings at the heart of England’s defence at Euro 2020.

And that’s fair enough when you consider they have become the first team not to concede a goal in their opening five matches at a European Championship.

But however well those three have played, there can be no arguing with the fact the Three Lions’ best defenders have been Declan Rice (above) and Kalvin Phillips – two men who have made themselves indispensable to Gareth Southgate and their team.

The job those two have done in putting out little flash fires as soon as they have appeared should not be underestimated.

It’s something they have been able to do so often because their positioning has been so good.

In doing so, they have given the two or three behind them, three or four if you include Jordan Pickford, the confidence to play in the manner they have done, and, as a result, they have made our defence virtually impregnable.

There were a couple of occasions on Saturday when Ukraine had five-minute spells in which they threatened us, and likewise Germany and the Czech Republic before them.

But the addition of the one extra defensive midfielder has shored up things in those moments and that’s some going when you consider that coming into the tournament most of the talk about perceived weaknesses with our team centred on defending.

It would have been easy for Southgate to bow to calls to unleash the midfield Dream Team at the expense of one of those two, but he stuck to his guns and it has worked.

That said, we’ve played largely against B-class opposition, with the exception of Germany and Croatia, who are A minus.

And had we met Denmark or Italy before now, or Portugal, they would have tested Rice and Phillips (above right) in a way none of those sides we have played have been able to do.

There’s a flip side to playing the extra defensive midfielder, of course, and it’s that only Hungary have made fewer key passes in an opponent’s half than England.

So there’s a question about what cost our defensive solidity comes at and it’s something we will have to address at some point soon.

Football is about balance and if you don’t get your balance right you will come unstuck eventually against the best teams.

Now, that might not happen in this tournament, we might go on to win it and we might go to the World Cup in Qatar next year as European champions.

But if there we come up against Argentina, Brazil or France, even South Korea, then one of those teams will test the two defensive midfielders to their absolute max in a way no one has done this time out.

It’s to Southgate’s credit that he thought, ‘There aren’t any teams in our group who will really test us, so let’s get momentum and results in these early games’.

But I now want to see a bit more of that balance at the other end of the pitch as well because, if we can find it, who knows where it might have taken

us in 18 months’ time.