England flatters to deceive Spain despite a brilliant start at the League of Nations meeting

A serious football lesson for England, but in the middle of seriously serious news. The desperately painful injury of Luke Shaw will naturally overshadow a 2-1 defeat to Spain where Gareth Southgate's team was defeated, outmatched and mostly outclassed.

The hope of Manchester United's left-back is that it does not prevent a spell that has had its best form since this terrible break in 2015. The requirement for Southgate is to take the next step and show that England has not only temporarily overcome its fundamental problems to qualify for the semi-finals of the World Cup. He must show that he can really solve these problems.

This match showed how much they are present, even if England was unhappy to have ruled out a late strike by Danny Welbeck.

This would have made the final score somewhat fanciful.

England still struggles to fight against a team with an appropriate midfield, and that's before we fail to beat a good team.

This is still one of the many problems that a supposedly transformative summer has not changed.

England was perhaps as unhappy as to immediately come up against a Spain that had already changed and she herself drew lessons from Russia in 2018.

There was very little of the crippling gravity that cost them so much in the psychodrama of this elimination of the last 16. Instead, it was replaced by a new directivity that the new manager Luis Enrique had so much at heart of instilling a return to its old, pressing ways – one of the qualities that really made the difference between 2008 and 2012.

Spain ironically opened the scoring. Although the Southgate defenders suddenly seemed uncomfortable when their space was closed, they had just enough battle to release the ball – and allow the attackers to exploit the much larger space that had opened behind them.

This youthful pace is one of England's best in open play and has been amplified by Shaw. This made his injury even more unfortunate. Shaw has brilliantly established his luck here, passing a beautiful ball – even if Dani Carvajal should have done better – for Marcus Rashford.

It was just that this advantage was so quickly swept away, as England still has some flaws that Southgate has to compensate for and which are particularly sensitive to elite international sides.

It is also because Spain has admitted to having eliminated some of its own faults. Their equalizer was not track 1, but was born from a ruthless game. Carvajal immediately made up for his mistake by exploding Shaw and feeding Rodrigo. The attacker showed the same force by breaking into the bypass line and then reducing Saul Niguez, who finished with certainty.

It was exactly the kind of abrasion and affirmation that Luis Enrique preached, and which was missing at his World Cup, with the necessary pace almost personified by Rodrigo.

He was then hit at home by Rodrigo, who made this stealthy run to a free kick for second base.

The fact that this is one of England's strengths in a set-set has only reinforced the feeling that the qualities that made the summer so joyful are limited and that Southgate still has a lot of work to do. make.

He tried to mitigate the amount of work his midfielder had to cope with this Spanish carousel by eventually bringing in Eric Dier for the bad goalkeeper Jordan Henderson. This decision, however, reflected only one of Southgate's major flaws, and a general struggle with replacements when a game needs to be changed.

The lush midfielder Luis Enrique had at that time taken full control of the ball, while showing himself at a few levels beyond England. This is ultimately the main problem for Southgate, and what cost them the most against Croatia at the World Cup.

You can not bypass the absence of a midfielder by skirting it for so long. It's still the area that really raises elite teams, where elite games are won.

Some of England's hesitations had to be put in the context of the naturally troubling reactions to Shaw's injury, but the game had already changed well before.

There were still some ironies, because Spain actually fell back into the scheme that cost them so much in Russia because it mostly wove passes instead of killing the match.

And although the big difference this time was a demonstration of power rather than confusion, and that they knew they were controlling, it meant that the game was still open.

It was almost the same when Rashford was let in again. His first contact was excellent, but his second was not, as a bad result meant that De Gea did not even need the kind of world class backup that he had produced against the same player earlier in the game.

The goalkeeper needed the help of the line judge's flag when Welbeck was accused of fouling him for that last goal. This late wave of England aside, however, would have deserved nothing more than a victory for Spain.

Luis Enrique's team still has some way to go, but not as much as England.

All that came back here was some truths at home.

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