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14 hours ago
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To see a world in a grain of meaningless friendly. It has become a habit to say you don’t learn anything from these games. This isn’t strictly true. You just don’t learn anything new. But it’s all still there, ready to be decoded like a set of sporting tea leaves.
On a strangely empty night at Wembley Stadium – also known as “a night at Wembley Stadium” – the opening half-hour of this 1-0 England defeat against Japan was fluffy, formless and free from any real edge. But that half-hour was also hugely telling, packed with echoes, ghosts and patterns. Another March friendly: another note in the never-ending story of England footballdom, an epic poem in 1,080 parts.
England did almost nothing of any real merit in that period. But it was valuable time for Thomas Tuchel, who must have hated with a violent water bottle‑hoofing passion the goal that his team conceded; and who will now have three months of duvet-clenching nightmares on his sweat-soaked goose-down divan over transitions, empty spaces and failed counterpresses.
Players came and went in the hour of football that followed. Energy was expended, but with a sense of packing up and putting things to bed. England’s best chances arrived when they decided to stick Dan Burn and Harry Maguire on and load some corners into the box.
But that opening half-hour will resonate, will haunt Tuchel’s moments at the espresso machine in his towelling dressing gown, and will surely reconfirm not just the makeup of the team, but its energy and attitude when the games start to matter. Not, it should be said, in a fun way.
Once again Wembley had a village fete feel before kick‑off. Wonderwall boomed out. Fireworks whizzed. Flames spurted. A selection of military personnel wobbled a tarpaulin. It felt a bit like a mini Olympic opening ceremony. Here are some Chelsea pensioners morris dancing to drill music. Here are the Spice Girls inside a bus made entirely from cheddar cheese. Here is a naval officer marching across a carpet end that looks like something left out on the Holloway Road.
Tuchel had little choice but to field a genuinely interesting lineup, his options narrowed by injury and omission. In outline a rump of Phil Foden, Morgan Rogers, Cole Palmer, Kobbie Mainoo looked fun and innovative. No power runners, no power tacklers, no power headers, no dogs, no clogs. A false 9. Drifting technicians. Yes, please. Inject this into my jaded, calcified England friendly international veins. Maybe this is just us now.
Early on it did feel light and easy. England were in crisp, clean perfect white. Tuchel was up on his touchline in puffy gilet and brown leather shoes, like a groovy junior headmaster. Some very nice footballers did some quite nice things. Mainoo looked slick and easy on the ball. Nico O’Reilly is just a natural. Play him anywhere.
There were triangles, squares, hexagons. What was the formation exactly? How do we notate this? 4-1-1-4? 4-2-freedom. 4-1-1-scented air. It was different. It was … quite good. It was OK. Perhaps a little vague and drifty and … oh.
At this point Japan scored a lovely goal, a goal that also involved easing right through the centre of England’s midfield. Palmer gave the ball away in an attacking area. Nobody filled the space behind. Mainoo was skirted like a discarded traffic cone. Japan ran down the other end and scored, easing through the heart of an England team that showed all the resistance of a damp sheet of 99p-shop kitchen towel.
The goal wasn’t Palmer’s fault. The ball will be lost there. The problem was the pressure behind him, the awareness of danger. Basically, there wasn’t any. You’re not getting past, say, Bernardo Silva in that position. You’re getting a niggly foul, a smiling handshake, a much-protested yellow card. As for recovery tackles and tracking back, Mainoo is a really good footballer, but he’s a very average sprinter.
Japan cut through the centre a few more times and should have scored again. It looked far too easy to apply the scalpel. And this was the lesson. This is why we can’t have nice things. This is why you need your dogs and your clogs and your rats. Written through half an hour of undercooked, semi-fluid football, this was why England play like England.
And even with a makeshift team, the problem here was the usual problem. Japan played like Japan. Whereas England played like the latest idea of whatever it is England are supposed to play like. This is not new information. In fact, nothing much will be changed by defeat here. Tuchel already knows his best squad. But it was a good night for Jude Bellingham, who had the huge advantage of not taking part; and also for the enduring truth that even in an era of raised expectations, England will always be at their best as pragmatists in borrowed tactical clothes, and as a team that know their limits. Now, how long before we fly off to win the World Cup?
