England have more stars than other Euro 2024 favourites. They also have more problems (2024)

The temptation, when considering each nation’s chances of winning a major tournament, is to simply list their best three players. You’ll hear pundits doing it this week, saying things like “… you know, they’ve got Cristiano Ronaldo, Bernardo Silva, Bruno Fernandes.” Analysis over.

In those terms, England are potentially the best side at Euro 2024 — you know, they’ve got Harry Kane, Jude Bellingham, Phil Foden. That trio comprise the best player, or very close to the best player, from three major European leagues in the 2023-24 season.

But tournaments are won and lost on cohesion rather than star names. And while England’s attacking options are as impressive as they’ve been for two decades, their XI is probably as unbalanced as it’s been in that period too — England are desperately short of an established option in three different areas.

International sides rarely go into tournaments with a nailed-on starting XI, and most victorious teams end up making a major change to their system en route to the final. Solving three different problem areas, however, may prove beyond Gareth Southgate.

For his fourth tournament in charge, the expectations for Southgate have never been higher, but the job has probably never been trickier, in part because he’s changed tack. Previously, Southgate had been a diplomatic figure, primarily concerned with togetherness, cohesion and motivation in the squad. He made ruthless decisions in the past — phasing out Wayne Rooney, dropping Joe Hart — but he made those calls because it was time to move on from that generation.

This time, he’s been tougher. Jordan Henderson and Harry Maguire were still considered key leaders in the group, but were dropped on fitness grounds. Henderson had returned to action before the end of the Eredivisie campaign, and Maguire was confident he would make it back for the knockouts. Southgate wasn’t convinced.

Those decisions are particularly bold, even considering their form at club recently, because England don’t have an established partner for John Stones in the centre of defence or for Declan Rice in the centre of midfield.

Marc Guehi, the most likely candidate to replace Maguire at centre-back, is a solid defender but has never played a European fixture for his club. In midfield, neither Kobbie Mainoo nor Adam Wharton had played top-flight football as recently as November, and Trent Alexander-Arnold, depending on your interpretation of his role for Liverpool, has barely played as a conventional central midfielder before. They seem to be ahead of Conor Gallagher, an actual central midfielder, in the pecking order. Square pegs in round holes are common at international level, but generally not along the spine of the side.

But an equally pressing issue is on the left, where England are likely to start the tournament without a proper left-back — Luke Shaw is still making his way back from injury — and possibly without a player accustomed to playing on the left of midfield either. And for anyone who remembers following England during the period when Southgate was a player, the old ‘left-sided problem’ feels somewhat familiar. The curious thing, however, is that the reason is entirely different.

In the 1990s, England’s left-sided problem — more specifically, a left-wing problem — was because they didn’t seem to be producing any left-footed players. There were very few left-footed midfielders, even substandard ones, to choose from, and the sporadic approach of pushing left-backs forward to the wing rarely worked.

But those were the days when English football thought the job of a wide midfielder was to stay wide, stretch the play and get crosses into the box. These days, it is all about the inverted winger, leaving England with three excellent attacking left-footed attacking midfielders — Bukayo Saka, Cole Palmer and Phil Foden — who primarily occupy inside-right positions, because they’ve been brought up to play from the right and cut inside. Strange as it sounds, England now have too many left-footed wide players.

So now Southgate has three problems stemming from this. First, none of those three — who probably all deserve to start based on performances over the last 12 months — have much experience playing from the left.

Second, Jack Grealish and Marcus Rashford — right-footers who do play from the left — have been so poor over the past 12 months that they haven’t made the squad.

And third, injuries to Shaw and Ben Chilwell mean England won’t have a proper overlapping left-back — at least, not a fully fit one — and therefore width might need to come from higher up.

All this means Anthony Gordon, who started in the friendly defeat to Iceland, has come into the equation. Gordon is a good player who had a positive season at Newcastle. He is a straight-line runner, offering speed and directness in behind, but he lacks finesse against deeper defences. Gordon might make the most sense tactically — he can provide England with thrust and width that neither the superior attacking midfielders in the squad nor the full-back behind him can offer from the left — but he is, at least at this stage, probably short of the quality you would expect to win a European Championship.

A fully-fit Shaw would make all this less of a problem. It’s worth considering that there does seem to be a pipeline problem for left-backs at the moment, and it’s unfortunate that England seem to have turned all their talented left-footers into right-wingers and not left-backs.

Strange though it might seem now, if Saka hadn’t emerged when Kieran Tierney was playing excellently for Arsenal, he could have become an Alexander-Arnold-style left-back, as his early performances in that role under Mikel Arteta were very encouraging. Until Shaw is fit, the right-footed Kieran Trippier will play there. The Athletic’s Liam Tharme has made a decent case for why fielding Trippier there hasn’t proved a problem for England in the past — but it’s also worth considering that Trippier endured a difficult season at Newcastle United, where he often appeared defensively vulnerable in his favoured position on the right. A switch to the left is unlikely to help.

England may end up playing a right-back at left-back, a right-back in central midfield, and a right-sided attacker on the left.

The perception back home is that this tournament is England’s to lose, that Southgate must deliver, but that notion is largely based on a handful of key players. Look deeper and Southgate has a much tougher job assembling a cohesive XI than the managers of France, Germany, Spain or Portugal. England have star quality — but, not for the first time, it seems unlikely they will have balance.

(Top photos: Getty Images)

Michael Cox concentrates on tactical analysis. He is the author of two books - The Mixer, about the tactical evolution of the Premier League, and Zonal Marking, about footballing philosophies across Europe. Follow Michael on Twitter @Zonal_Marking