KALVIN HOLDS KEY TO HOME HOPE
‘Yorkshire Pirlo’ stars as Grealish waits in wings
DESPITE the inevitable accompaniment to the lap of honour after England’s opening win, football is not coming home.
But there are encouraging signs that it might just be checking its pocket for keys and trying to remember where it put its coat.
One thing is for sure after the Three Lions opened the European Championship with a win for the first time ever – it has a carefully planned route.
And a man in charge has the clear head needed should growing expectation and alcohol-fuelled delirium begin to grip the nation in the coming weeks. The nation wanted Jack Grealish; Gareth
Southgate went for Kalvin Phillips, who is a bit more Jack-of-all-trades.
Not only was the player dubbed the “Yorkshire Pirlo” the undoubted man of the match for the way he denied Luka Modric the space he needed to weave his own magic, but it was his skill and balance that set up England’s winning goal.
Grealish had finally been sent to warm up as England’s bright start began to drift. “Super, super Jack,” sang the Wembley crowd as he went on his warm-up jog. But out on the pitch, Phillips was making another probing run out of his deeper-lying position.
This time, beating two players, he bent the perfect pass into Raheem Sterling and the Manchester City man toe-poked his first goal at a game in a major tournament in his 13th attempt. Thankfully, on a baking hot day under the giant arch, it was enough.
There were a few nervous moments late on, but this was an afternoon in which everybody ticked their boxes – even England’s shaky defence.
As early as the sixth minute, Phil Foden showed that at some point he is going to light up this tournament with something exceptional.
LINE CALL: England manager Gareth Southgate shouts instructions from pitchside Sterling’s simple pass to him was actually overhit, but the ball stuck to Foden’s toe like there was nowhere else in the world it would rather be. Such a shame that his curling left-foot shot bounced back cruelly off the inside of the post. Phillips forced the first saved with a zipping 20-yard volley from a corner and Tyrone Mings, with a strong header and an uncompromising block, began to settle more comfortably into his new role as an international centre-back.
In the heat, though, England’s pressing game began to wilt and all the time the scores were level, they needed to dig
deep to find something to hurt a Croatia side which, with its gilt-edge midfield, had begun to look ominously comfortable.
Another pleasing thing, then, has to be that England continued to push forward even after they went ahead.
Foden and Sterling combined with Mason Mount in arguably their best move of the day to cross to Harry Kane and if the England captain was unlucky not to open his Golden Boot bid he was even more unlucky to clatter rather painfully into the post.
If Sterling had kept his head better than clattering a free shot from 10 yards horribly over the bar from a late set-piece, the scoreline might have been more flattering.
England fans will take heart from some impressive late cameos from Jude Bellingham, Marcus Rashford and Dominic Calvert-Lewin that suggests that the depth really is there.
Grealish, as it happened, never got to strip for action. Collectively, England broke the 100km barrier in distance run in the long heat and if football really is to come home, everybody will need to take their turn to help it along the way.
One suspects Southgate has the route meticulously planned and is saving him for Scotland.