England defeated Portugal last night at Wembley, but questions have been asked regarding Roy Hodgson’s tactics.
Ian Wright didn’t hold back in his criticism of England’s display
Arsenal legend Ian Wright has slammed England’s performance against Portugal, labelling them as ‘very poor’, as reported by the Daily Mail.
Wright also believes Harry Kane and Jamie Vardy were effectively made redundant by being played out of position. He was part of the ITV Sport panel, and spoke following the game about the Three Lions’ display:
“We gave the front three the big build-up but it didn’t really happen. We didn’t get our offensive game going at all today – we looked really poor. They had to do a lot of work defensively.”
Wright feels that England didn’t play to Harry Kane and Jamie Vardy’s strengths
With Kane and Vardy deployed in wider areas, much of their time was spent tracking back and trying to prevent attacking bursts from Portugal’s full-backs.
The former Gunners striker also highlighted how the lack of width in midfield gave the Portuguese wide men license to attack down the England flanks, which in turn forced Kane and Vardy to be dragged back into wide areas defending:
“But if we weren’t so narrow in the middle, the midfielders could have closed the Portugal full-backs down and we could have got Jamie Vardy and Harry Kane in the game.”
Many England fans want to see the Tottenham and Leicester strikers played together in a 4-4-2. They scored 49 Premier League goals between them during this past season, and many international teams would not have faced the kind of threat that the partnership of Vardy and Kane would provide.
Kane and Vardy will be crucial to England’s Euro hopes
Vardy, 29, has blistering pace, and this must be utilised with him playing off the shoulder of the last defender, not in a wide left role where his strengths become ineffective. Likewise with Kane, he needs to be the focal point of England’s attack, not running all over the pitch to prevent opposition forays forward.
For this to work, there has to be more width in the midfield, which will mean sacrificing one of England’s star players to enable genuine wingers to ingratiate themselves into the lineup.
Whether Roy Hodgson agrees with this is another matter entirely, and could be a deciding factor in England’s European Championship hopes.
England manager Roy Hodgson has a lot of work to do if England are to challenge in France
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