Sky announce probable England team to face Italy

From Rhys Jaggar:

Rooney and Kane start together tomorrow night.

I was wondering whether Roy would have the balls to try:

Hart:

Clyne, Jagielka, Cahill, Bertrand;

Henderson, Carrick;

Walcott, Barkley, Rooney;

Kane

All would depend on whether Walcott and Barkley had the discipline and desire to do sufficient covering, tracking back and tackling to win the ball back, I guess.

Obviously, the defence may not be perfect, but the available squad members being what they are…….do you play Chris Smalling at Left Back or Right Back?? Do you play Jones and Smalling both as defensive full backs?? (I wouldn’t, but it depends on how defensive you want the back four to be I suppose against a side like Italy who know how to keep the ball……)

But if you had that front four plus Clyne and Bertrand pushing up in a controlled manner, you might have an attacking 6 to put the willies up the Italians……

The question would of course be whether the holes left behind would be manna from heaven to the Italians on the break?!

That’s football management, I guess….

Myles says:

One of the things I did when I finally grew up was to stop picking the England team.

If you do that you can be disappointed an hour before kick-off. I prefer to wait …and be disappointed later.

The result of this match isn’t important to Italy but they might do just enough to avoid defeat. How will Inter captain and centreback Andrea Ranocchia (27) do against Kane & Wayne?

The Italians take defending very seriously and that’s one of the things I like about them

And Conte will have a whole new midfield.

THAT MAKES THE RESULT VERY UNPREDICTABLE.

Carrick may be England’s key man tonight

I’ve seen the unreliable Ross Barkley do eye-catching things and hope he can give us a few good passes and a decent shot tonight.

UPDATE AT 7.45 am

Almost choked on my yoghurt & blueberries when I saw the Probable England team on Sky Sports News.

Hart

Clyne Smalling Jagielka Gibbs

Henderson Jones Delph

Walcott Rooney

Kane.

A team of big strong yeomen? Is that all we have?

Could that eleven keep the ball?

That’s a scared team built to grind out a draw against an experimental Italy eleven.

Still, maybe it’s not the team.

Let’s not expect too much. With Engerland, we never do.