Euro 2024 will be a tournament that defines Gareth Southgate… he MUST bring home something other than compliments, writes IAN LADYMAN

Gareth Southgate’s provisional squad for the Euro 2024 final is so packed with attacking talent and creativity that even the England manager himself may not have dreamed of it as recently as a year ago.

Phil Foden is the Premier League player of the year. Jude Bellingham may become a Champions League winner for a week with Real Madrid on Saturday. Harry Kane has scored so many goals for Bayern Munich that he threatened to break all Bundesliga records. And then there are the newcomers and the outliers.

Cole Palmer, Chelsea’s new darling. Anthony Gordon, transformed from a skittish winger at Everton to an international class striker with 18 months at Eddie Howe at Newcastle. All that before we talk about Ollie Watkins – all of whom grew up with 19 Premier League goals for Aston Villa – and those we’ve known for a long time, Jack Grealish, James Maddison and Jarrod Bowen.

So it is no problem that Southgate thinks he can leave for Germany in three weeks without players like Marcus Rashford and Raheem Sterling. Tough and elite performers at international level – they have 37 goals between them for England – have now both been made redundant by their own modest form and the way a new and younger breed has passed them by on the outside.

In particular, the fact that Rashford is not included in a squad of 33 that will be reduced by seven once England have played the warm-up matches against Bosnia and Iceland comes as a shock. But it’s not about the form, it’s about the reputation. It’s the right decision. All Southgate needs to do now is arrive in Gelsenkirchen for his team’s opening match against Serbia on June 16 with his team in the right physical and mental shape to justify their status as one of the tournament favourites.

Jordan Henderson (left) and Marcus Rashford (right) are among the major absentees

The England squad is packed with attacking talent, including Harry Kane (left), Jude Bellingham (second right) and Phil Foden (right), while Declan Rice (second left) is essential in midfield

And this, in short, is where the questions begin. Whoever catches the plane to their training camp in Germany, England will arrive with perhaps the most fearsome attacking line-up of the tournament. But Southgate’s squad is also struggling with defensive injuries, to the extent that he today said this is the worst he has ever known.

He may not have a recognized left-back, given the head coach’s gloom over Luke Shaw’s chances of recovering from injury in time.

Neither of his two favorite centre-backs – Harry Maguire and John Stones – have played for their clubs, while the understandable exclusion of Jordan Henderson and Kalvin Phillips leaves Arsenal’s Declan Rice with a huge burden to carry for the back four. of what we hope will be a seven-match tournament.

As he spoke this afternoon, you could almost imagine Southgate trying to balance the two sides of the equation in his head. Finally someone just asked him. Can we win this thing or not?

“Yes, I mean, of course everyone is waiting for that headline,” Southgate smiled.

‘I’d be an idiot if I said, ‘No.’ And if I say yes, that doesn’t mean that there isn’t a lot of work ahead of us.

‘There is no doubt about what is possible. The team has already been very close, so they know what is possible.

‘They know what they have won at club level and what it takes. But in knockout football we have seen in the Champions League that Arsenal and Man City were among the best three teams in the Champions League this year. Neither of them got to where they hoped they would.

There are some talented newcomers with Cole Palmer (right) who have not been breaking into the team for very long

Southgate’s favorite centre-backs John Stones and Harry Maguire do not play for their clubs

‘These are fine margins and that is our world. You are judged and have to deliver at those moments. “But are we one of those teams that can win, of which there are a few? Yes, we certainly are.’

This will undoubtedly be a defining tournament for Southgate in terms of his reputation. It could also be his last. He has taken England to the brink twice. A World Cup semi-final in 2018 and a European Championship final – lost to Italy on penalties – in 2021. He has previously acknowledged that he needs to take home something other than compliments this time.

Southgate has been accused of cronyism in the past. Not today. For example, Henderson was still in Southgate’s squad last November and was still in his squad in March. Now his international career lies dormant and perhaps even extinct.

This time he has chosen an inexperienced team and that comes with a risk. Nine players have transferred from the group with which he went to the World Cup in Qatar eighteen months ago. Only 16 of these 33 have ten or more caps.

Kane is the team’s top scorer with 62 goals. Furthermore, only Bukayo Saka is in double figures and he has eleven. Third highest scorer in this group? Maguire with seven.

“We’ve never had so many injuries,” said Southgate.

“I would say we’ve never had so many unknown situations. There are some injury issues that are very obvious and obvious, and there are some that are a little more nuanced and that we don’t have all the information about.

‘Sometimes you have to work with the players and see how they react physically to training.

The left back position is the biggest problem with Luke Shaw not playing since February

“This is as complicated a group as I can remember, and we’ve had quite a few complicated ones.”

As it stands, left back Shaw is the biggest problem. The Manchester United defender has not played since mid-February and Southgate is openly pessimistic.

“I’d have to say he’s a gamble,” he said.

Time will tell, but in the meantime, Southgate will try to accentuate the positives.

Few teams will be as intriguing or hopefully as exciting to watch this summer as England in Germany. It’s been a while since we said that. The problem of keeping the back door closed when they don’t have the ball needs to be solved by Southgate.