Southgate must give freedom a chance after poor England show

Put out more flags. Dust down the red and white jester’s hat. Root outthe gumshield, the crumpled Yekaterinburg metro map. And prepare to headonce more into that strangely gruelling territory between bruised andfearful cynicism and the eternal quiver of tournament hope.England have booked their place at the World Cup in Russia after surelythe most meandering, flaccid qualification victory yet devised by anyEngland team. Slovenia were beaten by Harry Kane’s goal but make nomistake – this was both a dreadful game of football and a numbingspectacle for those loyal supporters still willing to drag themselvesout on a Thursday night to enter the vast money-rinsing concretecauldron of the Wembley entertainment complex.Victory may have sealed qualification, but it also deflated further anyrealistic expectations of what might happen when England get there. Thisshould be of great concern to the Football Association. There are only so many times even England fans will be prepared to pay£40 for the pleasure of throwing paper aeroplanes at the pitch, whichbrought the loudest cheers of the night right up until Kane’s finish instoppage time. At the end England’s players gathered in the centrecircle and wandered around applauding the empty red plastic seats andthe backs of people queuing to leave while the PA burbled gamely aboutthe prestige friendlies to come. As an image of England football 2017,and the slow, gilded death for what was once football’s most compellingtheatre, it is probably quite hard to beat.England were at least terrible in a grimly fascinating way. Gone are thedays when a poor England team sent it long, seeking out the head ofsome game forward battering ram. Here they were terrible in the new style, passing to each other butsetting out with two lumbering central midfield wardrobes shielding adefence threatened only by its own misplaced passes. In the opening hourthey produced a performance so lacking in purpose and precision it waslike watching a piece of performance art, a 45-minute Warhol-style shortfilm called Wembley Angst No. 94. England did improve after the hour mark but by then they had a lot ofground to make up from a standing start as the game congealed early oninto another game just like the other games. Jordan Henderson had theball quite a lot, worrying about from side to side, always looking backinto the ohmic safety of his defence. Midway through the half Englandproduced a stunningly terrible free-kick routine, working the ball veryslowly backwards and finally teeing it up for Henderson to perform aspectacular falling-over air-kick on the edge of the area. Grimly,Slovenia cleared.Only Marcus Rashford seemed really interested in trying to run forwardquickly. Raheem Sterling ran quite a lot. Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain playedlike Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain. And that was pretty much that for themost soft-pedalled minor chord moment of qualification imaginable, givena spark of life at the death by Kane’s opportunism.What now then? One thing is clear. England does not expect. It has beenmore than a decade since the national team had the luxury of travellingin a state of doomed optimism, the mood ever more stricken since thatgolden, foolish summer of 2006 when the world was still young, whenCrouchie did the robot with Prince William, and when the idea of somegrand Premier League talent-legacy waiting to be spent died for good onthe fields of Stuttgart, Cologne and Gelsenkirchen.The challenge now for Gareth Southgate is not to try to reach the WorldCup final. It is to produce a team that people actually want to watch.This has been a deathly qualification, with only 16 goals scored and afeeling of having spent endless hours watching England’s furrowed andfearful back five play a variety of keep-ball.From here it seems absolutely clear Southgate needs to take a chance, tochuck out the Dan Ashworth handbook of mind-bogglingly dull andoutmoded possession football, to accept that playing with adventure,life, pace, and risky attacking vim might revive not just the dwindlingEngland brand but his own managerial career.In their current guise, watching England is like watching a 12-roundundercard split decision wrestle-off between a pair of ponderous 15sttaxi drivers, the craft-free double defensive midfield bolt themanagerial equivalent of tucking both your shirt and your vest into yourunderpants.What is the point of playing this way? From here to next summer everymoment of Southgate’s time should be devoted to trying to wring the mostout of what he does have, a spritz of genuine forward talent in Kane,Dele Alli and Rashford. He needs a midfielder who can pass. And he needsto trust his defence to carry the ball forward. Success for this teamwould involve simply playing with a little freedom, exploring their ownlimits and refusing to leave the competition until they have at leastbeen beaten by a demonstrably superior team. Score some goals. Produceat least one performance that lets everyone feel giddy and stupid anddeluded for four days in June. There is a wider issue here about international football itself. Whenthe away fans in Malta last month sang “we’re s**t” they weren’t angryor incensed or spoiling for a fight. They were taking the mickey out of the whole thing: England, us, them,the enduring disjunct between a domestic league of such screechingurgency and a national team who have withered in its shadow. Take note,Gareth. It is when they stop booing you really want to start worrying.For now England will travel with hope, as ever. But not much of it.