England star Sterling issues blunt response over Southgate tactics

The debate has raged most of the summer and escalated on Friday after another tepid display in the 1-0 defeat to Italy in Milan. From pundit to pub bore, everybody seems to be asking why England don’t ditch the back five and experiment with a more attack-minded flat back four.

So I decided to put the same question to Raheem Sterling – only to be pinged with the most definitive of conversation-stoppers. “Because the manager wants to play a back five,” the Chelsea winger said.

Conversation stopper because the FA media officer stepped in at that point to move the discussion along. But Sterling had already let slip that England players spent most of their training session at Tottenham’s training ground yesterday trying different ways to free up attacking players with that extra central defender in the team.

“Even today we had to go over things to try to find where we can find that extra man with this five at the back,” Sterling said. “Do we put a midfielder higher up in the build-up? The manager is working on things to get us that space in the attacking third to try and change that but it’s not a time to panic and say, ‘We haven’t scored, we haven’t scored!’

“We need a good performance and one of our big players to step up and change that narrative. That is more than likely what will happen.” Gareth Southgate is not stubborn; he has fixed upon this unpopular system because he has calculated it gives England their best chance of progressing at Qatar.

Given his track record – those two semi-finals and a final – perhaps he is owed a bit of loyalty. Certainly the players he has melded together from the void after Euro 2016 are keen to show him some – not least Sterling, one of a handful who has been there for the entire journey.

“Like everything it has to come from the boys,” he said. “We have said that these results over the last few months have not been good enough and we need to take responsibility. We have to have that winning mentality. When the boys have been speaking, the message has been to get more out of each other, push each other, take criticism. If someone is not doing something right then we have to push each other to try and get the best for the team.

“I know there has been a lot on Gareth and what he has been doing – formations and whatnot – but the performances have not been right. It’s not nice to see your manager getting criticised. But it’s also not something we are surprised by. We are expected to win. We are expected to produce good football and over these last couple of months, it has not been up to the level.”

The last time the Three Lions played Germany, of course, the performance was exemplary, a curse appeared to have been buried and England remained on course for their first major final in 55 years at Euro 2020.

“Football is brutal at times,” Sterling smiled at what he described as one of the highlights of his career. “Yes, it was a great tournament last summer but once you produce like that, people expect more.

“Then when you put results like our recent ones on the table, they’re going to be asking questions. For me, they are right to ask these questions. It’s down to us to change that and make people realise we are the real deal.”

PROBABLE TEAMS

ENGLAND (4-2-3-1): Ramsdale; Stones, Dier, Maguire; Trippier, Henderson, Rice, Chilwell; Sterling, Kane, Saka.

GERMANY (4-2-3-1): Trapp; Kehrer, Süle, Schlotterbeck, Raum; Kimmich, Arnold; Hofmann, Müller, Musiala; Nmecha.

REFEREE: Danny Makkelie (Netherlands)