England World Cup Team: Milner evacuation was damage limitation

England / Jamie "The Pacman" Pacheco / 13 June 2010 / Leave a comment Free £25 Bet

Milner trundles off after a gamble that didn't work

Jamie Pacheco looks back at the England v USA match and tells us how Fabio Capello took a leaf out of Dickie Bird's book en route to rescuing a potentially disastrous situation.

"I like James Milner a lot, as it happens. I like his versatility, the fact he’s virtually two-footed, his spirit, his temperament and his delivery from set pieces. I’m clearly not the only one and if rumour mills are to be believed, there’s more than one Premier League club willing to shell out in excess of £25 million for his services next season."

I didn't agree with Fabio Capello's decision to play James Milner in the holding midfield role against the USA. Those lucky enough to have followed my live blog on Saturday night on this very website will know I expressed my concerns as soon as the line-ups were announced. I like James Milner a lot, as it happens. I like his versatility, the fact he's virtually two-footed, his spirit, his temperament and his delivery from set pieces. I'm clearly not the only one and if rumour mills are to be believed, there's more than one Premier League club willing to shell out in excess of £25 million for his services next season. The Betfair "Milner to stay" market makes him odds-against to still be a Villa player next September and my instinct is that's right and that whether Martin O'Neill likes it or not, he's likely to be on his way from Villa Park sometime this summer, a decision based purely on financial grounds.

I can understand Fabio Capello's dilemma ahead of the USA match, he clearly likes to play a holding midfielder in his side and the other players are used to having one. But we must remember Milner was a winger when he first came on the scene with Leeds (and then Newcastle) who was turned into a central midfielder by O'Neill. But by no means a holding midfielder; at Villa Stylian Petrov plays the deeper of the two with Milner acting as playmaker, albeit with some defensive responsibilities of his own.

To play Milner - a player with just eight international caps to his name before last night - in a crunch match like that amounted to the sort of gamble that the late Kerry Packer would have been proud of. Worse still, in the absence of too many "ball players" in the side, the USA adopt a high-tempo game based on tough tackling and energetic hassling, hardly the sort of match in which to play a guy making his first World Cup appearance who had been suffering from illness all week in the lead up.

Just half an hour into the match Milner had left Ashley Cole exposed at left-back, seen little of the ball himself, given away three free-kicks and got booked, which is ultimately why he was hauled off. Shaun Wright-Phillips came on for him to play on the left and Steven Gerrard, who would have been my initial choice for the holding role, filled in for the Villa man. Which he did very well.

I remember reading the autobiography of former cricket umpire Dickie Bird a few years back where he spoke about making a decision out there in the middle (that soon afterwards he realized had been the wrong one) and the temptation to make amends by giving the "unfortunate" side some sort of reprieve later on to level things out. If you do that, you will then have made two wrong decisions, he said. And that's what happened with Capello last night, A prouder, more arrogant manager (I'm thinking Raymond Domenech here) would have persisted with his original selection and seen it through which would have meant one of two things: Milner would get booked again at some stage and England would be massively under the cosh or the midfielder would have spent the remainder of the match going into tackles half-heartedly.

All that aside, England looked a good team with pace on the wings, Gerard playing the best in an England shirt he has for ages and Wayne Rooney improving as the match went on. All well and good but that doesn't explain why England are still as short as [1.6] to top this group. The USA are more than capable of bettering whatever it is that England do in their remaining two matches but if they were to lose against Slovenia, who looked organized if not inspired this afternoon, it's all of a sudden Matjaz Kek's side who'd be in pole position to top the group. I expect England to go through to the last sixteen but Capello can't afford to make too many more blunders in his remaining two matches of what looked like such a promising campaign a couple of months ago. Or else it will be over before it's even started.

Tags: England v USA, England world Cup team, England worldCup odds, Fabio capello, James Milner, Wayne Rooney