England interim manager Lee Carsley said after their resounding win to Ireland that the way the team played was “definitely not his style; it’s the players’.” It was not the zonal Southgate team; it was a much more fluid team tailored to each individual.

There were much more rotations at the back. Some would say too much, but we are used to England sitting still.

During Euro 2024, Phil Foden and Jude Bellingham would move, drop, and switch sides, but the base of the midfield, Declan Rice and Kobbie Mainoo, didn’t move without the team. Mainoo, or Connor Gallagher, would sometimes push further forward up the right half-space, but you’d rarely see him and Rice switching sides.

Southgate gave them some freedom; it wasn’t a super rigid system, but everyone stuck to their individual zones. He built a structure to beat most opponents and then plopped players into each position. That way he could change one player for the other with little changes to individual instructions.

Against Ireland, Lee Carsley’s plan seemed more geared towards maximizing each individual by giving them the freedom to make their own decisions on what position they felt most comfortable playing, with no restrictions on which zones they could or could not enter. They were given a role not a position.

Lee Carsley in an interview with TalkSport:

We try and not be too restrictive on playing in a certain position, it’s more the role and the responsibility in the area of the pitch they’re in. As opposed to seeing them in positions, have they got the profile and attributes (we want)?

[…] We might label players as ‘right back’, ‘central midfielder’, ‘defensive midfielder’, but there are actually lots of different types of these positions.

In Carsley’s post-match press conference, he mentioned that he studied tape of Ireland, and then translated his ideas for what structures:

I make a note before the game, shapes that the opposition might do. Obviously, with this job, we have a lot of thinking time. I’m constantly looking at if they change to a four, this is how we can build, if they change to a three, this is how we can build. […]

When we go into halftime, I try not to give the players too much information but to try and give them two three bullet points that are really going to affect the second half.

He can go; here is what the opponent is going to do; you all are the best players in England, some being the best in the world; here is my suggestion on the starting structures, but find your own solutions.

He isn’t restricted to specific profiles because there won’t be one or two formations. They’re constantly rotating, moving into their favored position for that moment.

And then you did see players, like Bukayo Saka, coming all the way over from the other side of the pitch to help overload the opposite wing. I wish Jack Grealish did that more often when the ball was on the right wing to help Trent Alexander-Arnold, Declan Rice, Kobbie Mainoo, and Bukayo Saka.

You could see the players adjusting the structure on their own depending on what Ireland were doing. They’d combine on a wing, Ireland would become compact, and then England would spread out on the wings.

Trent Alexander-Arnold and Declan Rice were taking turns playing in the midfield, and at right-back, Rice was making runs to the front line in the right half-space. It was completely unpredictable, but it all looked natural. Nothing was forced.

Jack Grealish does a good job floating in behind Ireland’s defensive line to the top of the box for the shot. He is a different player when he plays in the left half-space, more similar to that of the player we knew from his time at Aston Villa.

That free-flowing nature of their attack then naturally creates these wonderful one-twos, give and goes.

When players aren’t tethered to one zone, their instinct will be to get forward. And these players are experienced enough to know how to cover for each other. Allow Declan Rice to attack space, and he performs that one-two, gets played into the box, cut back, and Jack Grealish scores. This goal would never happen if you forced Rice to sit behind the rest of the midfield to the left of Mainoo.

The thing I liked the most is that when England went two nil up, they didn’t then gift the ball to the opposition and defend their lead for 75 minutes. They continued to attack.

I hope Lee Carsley stays on as the manager full time. He knows almost all of the players through his work managing the U20 and U21 teams since 2020, and I think his way of thinking better suits the talent at their disposal. He won’t limit their creativity. I feel like this team, with this system, would have performed better in the Euro’s.

Match: Ireland 0-2 England, 7 September 2024