Gareth Southgate Can Help England Rebuild from the Back

By
at Internationaled.org

Published: November 16, 2016

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There was a moment midway through the first half of England's 3-0 win against Scotland at Wembley Stadium on Friday when Joe Hart received the ball to his feet, looked at his options and chose to ignore each of his centre-backs who were beckoning to receive it from him, instead taking a touch and thundering it upfield into the opposition half.

It was a frustrated swipe from the on-loan Torino goalkeeper, one that seemed to be saying: "Enough; enough dallying at the back, enough heart-in-mouth moments in defence."

John Stones and Gary Cahill had more than once in those first 20 minutes almost danced themselves into a mess trying to pass and move their way out of defence; and the England 'keeper was in no mood to let any concerns about the way his Manchester City manager, Pep Guardiola, might have viewed a moment of artless distribution cloud his decision-making.



It was difficult not to spare some sympathy for Hart. It was only three-and-a-half months ago that he was uprooted from a club where he had been a stable and secure No. 1 and told to find a new home—all on the strength of some preconceptions about his reluctance to play with the ball at his feet.

In front of him in the England team, Stones is the player Guardiola has sought to build his ball-playing City defence around. Yet, for all the composure the former Everton defender shows in playing out from the back, he is still to eliminate from his game the doubts that he instils when overplaying and running into trouble.

Stones is not yet the bastion of reliability he will need to become to be thought of as one of the world's best, and this seemed to trouble Hart at Wembley.

On the face of things, this England team should be entering a period where there is a real consensus about how to handle the ball in their own third. If the goalkeeper looked unconvinced about his own role in the system against Scotland, then it was only b...
Article Source: Bleacher Report - International Football

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