Lee Carsley’s statement selection reveals bold plan to banish England’s eternal weakness

A journey that began driving the minibus for Coventry’s Under-18s could culminate in steering England to World Cup glory. Lee Carsley wouldn’t quite put it that way. England’s interim manager claims he has not thought if he wants the position on a permanent basis and said the FA has not asked him if he is interested in it. And yet if he has an extended audition for the role, he has begun by unveiling a vision as well as a squad with his stamp on it.

Four uncapped players, five members of the squad he took to win the European Under-21 Championships last year, 13 born in the 21st century but omitting nine of Gareth Southgate’s England Euro 2024 party: it seemed a way of shaping the future, rather than changing as little as possible and waiting for the next manager to make his mark.

Carsley was an admirable, but unglamorous, player. His coaching career had an unglamorous start, too, taking charge of the college team at Solihull on Wednesday afternoons, driving Coventry's teenagers around. Yet, he said, he does not feel overawed by his rise, while his blueprint is likely to be met with approval from the FA. It reflects the shift between the player and the manager. He was a defensive midfielder in often defensively-minded sides. He played for David Moyes and Alex McLeish, Gordon Strachan and Jim Smith, Aidy Boothroyd and Brian Kidd. But as a coach, he made a conscious decision to be different.

“When I started coaching, it was something I wanted to try and get away from,” he said. “I’d played in teams where you were very well-organised and you sat in and every now and then you had the ball, and then you broke. But I was mindful as a coach of how I wanted the players to feel. I want our players to be on the ball, I want our team to attack. I want us to be expansive.”

And he wants his sides to play a certain way. He recognises the English disease, the inability to keep the ball against top-class teams which has cost them in many a tournament match. “The control thing is definitely something we need to be better at,” Carsley said. Even in his greatest triumph, the 2023 European Championship final, it threatened to be their undoing.

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“We played against Spain and I didn’t think we had control, but we won the game,” Carsley said. “So that was definitely our work. There’s nothing worse than being stood on the sideline and thinking: ‘We’re out of control here. We can’t get the ball back and when we do get the ball back we can’t keep it’. That’s definitely something we need to be better at. We did it for the majority of the tournament and then, in the final, I’d say it was maybe 60-40. If we’re going to win a Euros and win a World Cup, we have to push it further forward.”

There is an understated ambition to him, the everyman who talked about England winning multiple tournaments by keeping the ball. “It’s got to be the plan; it’s got to be,” he said. “Otherwise, it’s 50-50. We might win one, we might not. The next head coach that comes in, he’s got to win one, and then another, and then another. That would be the plan rather than ‘We may win one’. We want to remove not the luck but the fortune, maybe.”

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And it is why his statement selection is his most unexpected. Angel Gomes was the youngest player to represent Manchester United since Duncan Edwards. But he was released in 2020, has spent the last four years with Lille and is uncapped; at senior level, anyway, because he excelled for Carsley’s Under-21s. And Gomes, crucially, can keep the ball.

“Our eye in not used to that kind of player,” Carsley said. As midfielders go, Gomes is less physical, more technical. “Angel is someone who does it week-in, week-out for a team out in France. He was such a talent, they had such high hopes for him at Manchester United. He’s just had to find a different route to get to where he is.”

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He attended Lille’s 4-3 defeat to Paris Saint-Germain in February 2023. The scorers for the winners came from the most star-studded forward line ever assembled, in Kylian Mbappe, Neymar and Lionel Messi, whose 95th-minute free kick proved decisive. But Carsley’s eye was drawn to Gomes. He recalled: “He was by far the best player on the pitch.”

Some 18 months on, Gomes was emotional to get the call from Carsley. “I’m not sure why he’s not been included previously,” the interim manager said. “I know that the senior staff have watched him and how impressed they were with him from the summer he had with us. He is a really good player and I think you will like him.”

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He prioritised players who he knows, but he also underlined that he appreciates the rhythm of the international game; that, too, could form part of a job application. “I described myself as being a safe pair of hands,” Carsley said. “By that I meant, I understand how an international window works. I understand what kind of sessions they need. How restricted some of the players are coming in physically and the quick turnaround in games.”

So far, he said, life hasn’t changed becoming England manager, but there are hints that is changing. “There has been once or twice and I’ve been in the car and my mind has wandered off and it sort of hits you, the responsibility,” he said. “You’re maybe listening to the radio and they’re talking about England and you’re thinking … that’s interesting! I might need to listen to a bit more of that.” And England may be listening to Carsley for three months, or for years to come.