Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Danny Welbeck will start England’s final Euro 2012 warm-up game against Belgium this evening as Roy Hodgson looks to assess the youngsters’ ability to make an impact in the tournament.
Hodgson has decided to give Oxlade-Chamberlain the opportunity to start the match at Wembley, having been impressed by his performances in training since he made his England debut as a substitute in the 1-0 friendly win over Norway a week ago.
The Arsenal player will start on the left wing, with James Milner on the right, as Hodgson continues to ponder his starting line-up for the opening group D match against France in Donetsk a week on Monday.
The other intriguing selection features Welbeck starting the match at centre forward, with Ashley Young, his Manchester United team-mate, operating in a free role. Welbeck missed the match in Oslo as he continued his recovery from an ankle injury, but he, like Oxlade-Chamberlain, has made a big impression in training this week and will start in preference to Andy Carroll as Hodgson looks to experiment before the meeting with France.
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Hodgson suggested yesterday that there will be a resemblance between his starting XI this evening and that against France nine days later, with Joe Hart, Glen Johnson, Gary Cahill, John Terry, Ashley Cole, Steven Gerrard and Scott Parker all confirmed starters.
The selection of Oxlade-Chamberlain comes as a surprise, but it is highly encouraging for the Arsenal youngster. Wayne Rooney, who will miss the first two group games through suspension, is likely to be a substitute tonight.
“I’m not concerned that I need to play the team against Belgium that will play against France,” Hodgson said. “But when I make the decision for that team against France, I want to have covered all the bases and know why I’ve chosen the players and what I’m looking for.
“I was satisfied with what I saw last week. Let’s see what team I pick tomorrow and if anyone else gets a chance, they can make an impression with me.”
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Hodgson will urge his players to use today’s last warm-up game to prove to the country that they will shed every last drop of sweat to be successful in Poland and Ukraine.
The England manager, 64, officially appointed on May 1 but West Bromwich Albion manager until May 13, will have conducted only five full training sessions with his squad before they fly to Cracow on Wednesday, with a maximum of a further four before their opening match in the competition.
Although Hodgson acknowledged that he has not had sufficient time to cast the team in his image, he is adamant that there will be no shortage of effort once the tournament gets under way, something that he hopes to see proved on his Wembley debut this evening.
“As a football coach who has worked year after year, done session after session, I find it very hard to understand how anyone can remotely imagine that, in two weeks and five training sessions, you could get a team playing the way you would like,” he said.
“If you ask me if I am happy that the players have responded well, and that the players have an idea of what we are looking for, then I am happy. I think they will be OK. But you do not model a team in two weeks. It’s not possible.
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“What do I want from it [the Belgium game]? I want the players to go and show how enthusiastic they are about this tournament, how determined they are to work their socks off to get the best results possible, that their attitude towards this tournament is going to be that no fair-minded person will be able to say they didn’t give their best, they didn’t work hard enough or want it badly enough. If they can give a performance that in some way shows that, it will make me happy.”
Gerrard will be partnered in midfield by Parker, despite concerns over the Tottenham Hotspur player’s Achilles problem, which cost him the last month of the season. “Scott has worked hard in training and he will get fitter by the day,” Hodgson said. “This will help him to get more match fitness. I ask him every day how he is, and he says he’s perfectly OK. He will get fed up with me asking.”