Lee Carsley can take a lot of satisfaction from England’s win against Greece.
For starters, the 3-0 victory in Athens has put the team’s Nations League promotion bid back on track and rectified the failure of Carsley’s attacking formation from their 2-1 loss in the reverse fixture at Wembley last month.
There was more structure and a defined game plan from the interim head coach on Thursday evening, which will partly restore his reputation and strengthen his candidacy for roles elsewhere.
His selection decisions — especially the surprising omission of England’s captain and all-time top scorer Harry Kane — were justified and, in some cases, necessary after nine players withdrew with injuries. Bringing on Lewis Hall at half-time for his debut also paid dividends.
Ollie Watkins’ opener was a partial vindication of the decision to start him over Kane and Curtis Jones’ superb finish for the third goal justified his call-up after an effective start to the season for Liverpool.
However, it was the second goal that will have brought the greatest satisfaction to Carsley the coach and his staff — even though it was technically an own goal by goalkeeper Odysseas Vlachodimos.
There was an element of luck about the fact that Jude Bellingham’s shot cannoned off the foot of the post and then bounced back off the legs of the sprawling Vlachodimos before crossing the line, but Carsley will still be delighted by the build-up.
It was a goal forged on the training grounds of many Premier League clubs, orchestrated by the coaches around England who can also take satisfaction. It was straight out of the modern coaching manual and was executed superbly through muscle memory.
Carsley is a classic training ground coach, preferring to be on the grass with his players rather than in front of the cameras, and he will be acutely aware of the modern philosophies that led to England’s second goal. Having come through the FA’s pathway, he will have seen the move mapped out many times.
“We had good defensive shape and character,” Bellingham told ITV afterwards. “The staff set up a perfect game plan, trying stuff with the ball — regardless of whether it comes off.
“It is a young team and we are all playing well for our clubs, all exciting players who want to get on the ball and be creative. We are going to lose the ball but regardless of how many times we tried and lost it, we carried on doing it. The most important thing was perseverance.”
England were under pressure, leading 1-0 with just under 15 minutes to go. Greece were growing in confidence and carrying a threat. They had just gone close through Christos Tzolis.
Defending a 1-0 lead, England could have been forgiven for sitting deep and defending — but Carsley was on the touchline urging his men to play higher up the pitch.
They listened. England kept playing, kept trying to pass through their opponents and continued looking to break the first press and play into space.
Greece had a good defensive shape and were not committing themselves as Rico Lewis played a triangle of passes to Kyle Walker and then Marc Guehi.
England were waiting for Greece to jump, to try to close down their back line and force a turnover of possession close to Jordan Pickford’s goal.
Lewis, Walker and other England players were trying to create passing lanes, moving the Greeks out of their positions to allow them to play forward. The initial phase of play may look slow but once the space emerges, the attack can be launched at pace.
That came when Guehi went wide to Hall. As his opponent jumped to press, Hall played back to Guehi and then gave himself an angle to receive the ball again, which opened up the ball down the line. Most sides in the Premier League look for this movement.
From a slow start, the move accelerates as Guehi is brave and takes on the player pressing him before returning the ball to Hall.
The left-back, who is left-footed — a quality Carsley had been unable to call upon during his interim tenure — takes one touch to shift the ball into the right position and plays the ball into the feet of substitute Morgan Rogers.
Bellingham is now in acres of space and England are through the initial press. Without even looking, Rogers will have known Bellingham was to his inside, so plays a first-time pass to the Real Madrid man.
Six Greek players are taken out of the game and England are breaking with four against a back line of three, who are all turning and running back towards their own goal. Defenders hate that.
Bellingham does the right thing and waits for a challenge from one of Greece’s defenders, but they keep retreating, which invites the 21-year-old to drive forward and shoot.
He was lucky with the eventual outcome but England are rewarded for being bold with the ball in a crucial period of the game.
Carsley can view moves like this as part of his legacy as interim head coach when Thomas Tuchel takes over as the full-time boss at the start of 2025.
It was a training-ground goal, drilled into every Premier League player through repetition during their regular shape work and then analysed afterwards in team meetings, where footage of every training session is reviewed.
It must be extremely satisfying when that hard work pays off.
