“With two midfielders ahead of you, you tend to get a lot of the ball which suits my game,” he continued. “I enjoyed it out there.”

Secondly, in a comment which says a lot about Capello’s thinking, Barry revealed that Fabio was a lot happier with the first-half performance than the second – the complete opposite of most English fans and pundits. Presumably, because we had the ball under much better control and our passing was more measured, whereas we gave away chances (and the goal) in the second half.

“He’s very pleased with the first half,” Barry told Sky Sports. “There were a few things in the second half we could have done better”

I also agree with Karl that Rooney can’t play as the lone striker. He obviously doesn’t like doing it, and he is so much more effective coming from deeper positions and with his back not to goal. He comes deep to look for the ball and then when our midfield players win possession, they have no outlet ahead of them.

If 4231 is England’s future under Capello, I would suggest to use Rooney in the middle of the 3, Owen upfront. I know Rooney is in a bit of a slump at the moment, but he will NEVER be the great goal-scorer that his position requires. He is also too impatient (which is not necessarily a bad thing) which causes him to drift inwards when he doesn’t get fed. (Don’t Capello know this?). He is made for a Maradona-like role – not as a point man.

My suggestion would be to drop Gerrard back as one of the 2 central midfielders (strangely enough, I think him and Carrick could do well there) and play J.Cole / Rooney / SWP or Lampard as the 3 forwards (that said, would love to see Jenas/Bentley included more), and Owen up top.

Seems pretty fine to me on paper…

I thought Gareth Barry was the only real disappointment, he didnt keep the ball well at all and looked a bit out of his depth as Gerrard, Rooney, Bentley & Jenas all raised their game….

Good to see a bit of energy about the display though, Bentley added a lot on the right, getting stuck in and running at players, Joe Cole did well in bursts, he is a match winner and Capello i think will use him as often as possible, im not convinced Young is good enough yet anyway and Downing hasnt done enough at this level despite a good season with Boro.

Jenas was a big plus point, he is back to the form he showed for Newcastle circa 2002 and lets hope he can keep that up.

the attitude of the players on the pitch matters, and I think part of Capello’s focus will be to change that attitude / bring in players with the right attitude.

Also, this was an experimental squad used to give a few players experience before more important games. They grew better as the match wore on, which as a Guardian columnist said, is positive and quite different from the past regimes.

Rooney – in a mini-slump for sure.

Jenas will improve with more games, but Cap won’t drop Gerrard and Hargo did better than Barry in the few minutes he played. I agree that Barry simply had an off day, but you can’t afford to do that with the limited chances one gets at international level. Plus as a holding midfielder you need to be tackling more and winning the ball more, not let players go by you – I know this was a friendly but still…

Joe Cole – fair enough, I’m critical of him (I suppose in comparison Wes Brown was the worst of the England players but then again we don’t hype him up as England’s #1 right-back, do we?) but that’s for a few reasons.

First, he’s not a genuine left-sided player, which means that we play too narrow with him on the left of a 4-4-2. He does better in a 4-3-3 / 4-5-1 but he’s far better as a left central midfielder than a left wide midfielder.

Second, I don’t understand all the praise he got yesterday – he’s very good at what he does, for sure, but he cannot be England’s ONLY left-sided option, can he? SWP has faults, Lennon has faults – in the same vein, Cole has his faults too, and our over-reliance on him can cost us sometimes.

Under McClaren, when the SWP / Richards combo was on fire on the right, you could see how much of a difference pace and width made on that flank. We never get that on the left with Cole. He’s great at cutting in, but once you have a solid right-back marking him and / or a holding midfielder to mop things up ahead of his defence, Cole’s game is severely restricted.

Saying that Cole does well is like saying that Beckham does well. I love Beckham to bits and want him in the England lineup, but practically speaking he gives England excellence in just one dimension. Cole is a bit similar, which is why I rate him more as an impact player than as a regular starter.

That’s not to say that we won’t win with him – it’s just that if I was there, I would have tried other people in his place. It’s not like a club where you need to buy a new player you know, we have the people available to us already.

Wow, that IS new…

I thought Jenas was superb, and it pains me to say it. He just seemed to have so much desire to have the ball! We can’t drop him for the next game.

Finally, I am marginally concerned by Rooney. He went for yet another delicate chip which was never on and did miss a few reasonable chances. I know that goals will eventually come, but you can’t deny that he’s in a mini-slump.