MY ACCOUNT
England’s winless run stretched to three games for the first time in four years after drawing 0-0 with Italy in the Nations League.
The Three Lions went close to taking the lead in the first half when Mason Mount struck the bar from close-range.
The visitors had chances of their own and were prevented an opener when Aaron Ramsdale produced a tremendous save to deny Sandro Tonali.
Raheem Sterling almost fired Gareth Southgate’s side ahead in the second half but the forward missed a fantastic opportunity from Reece James’ free-kick.
We have picked out five talking points from the stalemate at Molineux.
Terrific Tomori
Fikayo Tomori crowned a fantastic season — in which he won Serie A with Milan — by making his first start for England.
The defender faced off against a number of familiar opponents and looked at home in the heart of the England defence.
Tomori has often been overlooked for previous England camps but tonight’s display will surely have put him at the forefront of Southgate’s thinking ahead of the World Cup.
The centre-back looked comfortable on the ball and boasted a 94% pass success rate, while he also won two tackles and three ground duels.
Most importantly, Tomori made four recoveries — including a stunning stop to prevent an Azzurri counter-attack in the dying embers of the game.
Three Lions tamed
England captain Harry Kane was dropped to the bench for the clash and the Three Lions missed the striker’s presence in attack.
Southgate’s men mustered just four shots on target — posing minimal threat to Gianluigi Donnarumma’s goal.
The hosts offered very little going forward and have now gone more than four hours without scoring from open play.
Kane’s 65th-minute introduction increased England’s urgency as he repeatedly dragged Italy’s centre-backs out of position.
It is a conundrum that Southgate will have to solve ahead of the winter, with the Three Lions’ over-reliance on Kane growing.
He tried several players through the middle in Kane’s absence with Tammy Abraham, Sterling and Jarrod Bowen all getting a go as the central forward.
Bottom spot
The draw means that England now sit bottom of Group A3 — almost certainly ending their hopes of topping the table. Relegation is more likely as things stand.
It is also the first time that the Three Lions have gone three consecutive games without a win since September 2018.
But defender Harry Maguire spoke out in support of manager Southgate.
He said: “His record over the last four years speaks for itself — when you play at the highest level there’s pressure and scrutiny and criticism and every game that you don’t win there will always be criticism.
“Let the football do the talking — everyone get behind us for the World Cup and keep pushing us, we’re doing our best to improve.
“We’ve shown there’s still areas to improve and if we want to lift the World Cup we have to strive to improve.
New faces
European Championship holders Italy suffered heartbreak earlier in the year as they were beaten 1-0 by minnows North Macedonia in their World Cup playoff.
It has prompted a shake-up of the Azzurri squad with coach Roberto Mancini handing out plenty of debuts since.
It was a much-changed starting line-up from the one that England faced 11 months prior in the final of the European Championship. Just two members of that side started this encounter.
Gianluca Scamacca appears to have become Mancini’s first-choice striker and there will have been plenty of eyes on the Sassuolo talisman amind reported Premier League interest this summer.
The striker demonstrated his quality throughout, making runs in behind as well as providing a focal point and holding the ball up.
Too much football?
This was a third game in seven days for these two nations — so the low-quality fare can hardly have come as a surprise.
Off the back of a testing domestic season, both sets of players looked tired and a break is long overdue.
There was a real lack of urgency from either side as two heavily rotated XIs huffed and puffed without much success.
England are back at Molineux on Tuesday to face Hungary in their latest Nations League encounter of the summer. Italy travel to Monchengladbach to face Germany.
The winter World Cup in Qatar has forced UEFA’s hand when it comes to scheduling — but has anyone benefited?
