Wilshere's England - a force to be reckoned with

International friendly: England 2-1 Brazil

There's a tendency with England to get carried away following an unlikely win or convincing performance, thinking that they just set themselves on course for world domination. This time, however, there may be genuine reason to get excited.

The side that defeated Brazil on Wednesday evening struck a perfect balance of youth and experience, with the last of England's 'golden generation' showing they are not yet looking to retirement. But most promisingly we saw that the young guns were more than ready for the international challenge.

None more so than Jack Wilshere. The Arsenal midfielder was electrifying every time he got on the ball, and is exactly what England needed at Euro 2012. With the qualities Wilshere brings - guts, determination, passion - it is hard to believe that England would have folded in the way they did against Italy, before exiting with a whimper at the first knockout stage. Wilshere wouldn't have allowed it.

Roy Hodgson described what Wilshere brings as "energy, mobility and enthusiasm". He has so many strings to his bow and the superlatives have already come flooding in. Against Brazil he inspired the nation to victory with relentless eagerness. England have missed a player who shows no fear and is willing to take the game to his opponents.

Wilshere is mature beyond his years and this showed in the way he congratulated Wayne Rooney on his opener. Despite being Rooney's junior in terms of experience, Wilshere patted him on the head almost in the way a captain would. With this small gesture he appeared to demonstrate his pleasure at the team for performing to his standard. It was an interesting moment that revealed his natural leadership qualities.

Every team needs a player they can look to for a moment of inspiration. Someone who will not fold no matter what the pressure, a heartbeat that remains constant. At just 21 and in only his seventh match for his country, Wilshere has shown he can be that player.

Good riddance to a troublemaker

He has been a two-and-a-half year nightmare for Roberto Mancini, but the game is now up for Mario Balotelli, and the Manchester City manager can say good riddance to the troublesome striker.

Too often Balotelli appeared to behave more as a celebrity than a footballer, and allowed his profession to play second fiddle as fulfilling showbiz duty appeared to be of the utmost importance. During his time at Manchester City, the most talked about incidents involving Balotelli happened off the pitch. The most famous image of Mario may well be of him partying with Paris Hilton in Ibiza.

Having been offered a chance to prove himself again at Milan, Balotelli needs to distance himself from hedonistic indulgences and study how a serious sports person, such as Jessica Ennis, behaves. In a professional sense, Ennis is the anti-Balotelli. When on the Graham Norton Show alongside Ricky Gervais and Daniel Radcliffe, Ennis talked passionately about her training, brought her Olympic heptathlon gold medal to show and share, and left the joke cracking to the others.

Acting foolishly isn't her domain and she made no attempt to pretend it was. Were Balotelli on the show Norton could have quizzed him about the time he set fireworks off in his bathroom and nearly burnt his house down in the process, or when he threw a dart at a youth team player at training, or whether the fake Santa driving around Manchester handing out wads of cash was indeed him. He would hardly be recognisable as a footballer, but it's not a bad way to earn £180,000 a week, eh?

Aside from the outlandish tomfoolery, Balotelli scored 30 goals in 80 games for City and was a certainty from the penalty spot. However, he received four red cards and 23 yellows; that's just three fewer cards than goals scored. He fought Micah Richards, he fought his manager. He made it extremely difficult for any sincere City fan to take to him.

In an unforgettable demonstration of his huge potential Balotelli scored two pivotal goals to fire Italy to the Euro 2012 final, which led many believers to predict that he would start the 2012/13 season in the same devastating form. That never happened. Balotelli has scored one league goal all season; his attitude in training and on the pitch coupled with his antics off it led him to become the club's fourth choice senior striker, and subsequently being sold halfway through their title defence.

When Milan swooped with an offer of around £20m for the talent-wasting striker, Mancini could have hardly believed his luck. It allowed him to end the nightmare of nurturing Balotelli from wild to world beater with minimal transfer fee lost. Balotelli's ability is obvious but his application is sadly lacking.

photo by Piotr Drabik

Resilient, brave, occasionally brilliant - but beaten

Euro 2012 quarter-final: England 0 - 0 Italy (Italy won 4-2 on penalties after extra-time)

In terms of the quality of football played over 120 minutes, England had lost. Long before the actual penalty defeat. It was as if the players felt they were competing a long-distance desert race, desperately attempting to drag their dead, cramping bodies over the extra-time finish line.

Andrea Pirlo, the puppet master, had England at his mercy and the viewing public in horrified awe. His ability to exert a wizard-like influence on the game from such a deep-sitting position proved to be a tactical nightmare and a spectacle scarcely seen. There is no denying his passing was on top form, both in terms of range and accuracy. But he has been performing at that ultimate level all year for Juventus, where he was in many critics’ eyes player of the season. Pirlo was just doing his thing. And we had no plan - or so it seemed - to nullify him.

The problem lay in the position Pirlo operates in; he plays in-between the defence and midfield where he aims to orchestrate the team's tempo and play passes in all directions. Our orthodox 4-4-2 did not naturally lend a player to picking him up, and the result was Pirlo had both plenty of space and time on the ball throughout the match. Free reign to the one player we could not afford to allow free reign. He also roamed to the sides, where his crossing was equally threatening.

Going into the quarter-final there was genuine reason for optimism. England breezed through their group, and with two exciting performances. We showed against Sweden an ability to raise our game, find goals when needed. Against Ukraine, we withstood a barrage from an inspired host nation and there was a genuine feeling of togetherness that has been a missing ingredient of past campaigns. The first half performance was all that was missing, and against Italy we got it. But then we lost it.

In the second half we reverted to the negative mindset we displayed against France. Like someone who had been sat in an uncomfortable chair for too long, we slumped from sitting high with attacking posture to sagging around our box as our goal-threat evaporated.

'Same old England' describes the style of our exit as once again we departed on penalties. But if that is how our tournament is remembered, it will do England an injustice. There were numerous, if disjointed, examples of the talents and capacity needed to form a winning side. We just never managed to display them all together at once.

England: like a box of chocolates

You never know what you're gonna get

Off-field dispute, injury and unwillingness to be a standby gave Hodgson a rather large headache to select an appropriate back five for Euro 2012. But whilst missing Ferdinand, Cahill and Richards, England's defence comprising two players from Chelsea and two from Man City looked on paper one of the strongest of all nations, and would have been expected by many fans to be the one point they could rely on for consistency. In reality, the ability of Liverpool's Glen Johnson to rapidly recover position was needed on three occasions against Sweden.

The defence gave a stubborn performance in our opening fixture against France, establishing a forcefield around our box and restricting les Bleus to shooting from range. Because of the strength at the back, there was no legitimate claim that 1-1 was an unfair result despite France's domination in other areas. But for 15 minutes of madness at the start of the second half of the second game, England conceded twice to the aerial threat of Olof Mellberg. Their Euro aspirations looked in tatters, and it took a true super-sub performance from Theo Walcott to get England back on track.

Despite boasting a well-rounded set of skills - work-rate, stamina, strength, positioning, crossing - James Milner has disappointed. Extremely un-eye-catching against France, once he picked up a yellow against Sweden his worth as defensive cover on the right flank was severely devalued. Milner was quickly substituted for Walcott to make his first appearance at the tournament, and score a goal from the trequartista position that no one had seen him do before!

Hodgson was credited for the switch as a 'genius tactical move', but even the manager would not have forseen Walcott's impact to be that equalising goal. The Arsenal forward went on to excel himself and ensure the rescue mission that he started was completed. Minutes later, Walcott darted between Sweden's crowded defence and teed up Welbeck to apply a stunning winner. 

Most prominent bearer of the unpredictability factor is the returning Wayne Rooney. It has almost been a case of one step forward and two steps back ever since his introduction to the international scene in 2003. As a teenager Rooney made his mark on major tournament football the following year with two group stage goals against Switzerland. At the following World Cup, however, he was red carded for stamping on Ricardo Carvalho in the crunch, grudge quarter-final affair with Portugal.

Fast forward six years to the present day, and at 26 Rooney is no longer one of the young guns; he is England's talisman up top. Today is the day of redemption for Rooney, England's caged lion is ready to be unleashed on the tournament having waited out a reduced two game ban received at the end of qualification.

After taking four points from two tricky opening fixtures, with experimential lineups, England can really kick on with the team Hodgson envisaged when he took up the reigns. That team will feature Rooney at the heart of all attacks, whether starting a move from dropping deep into midfield or meeting a cross with a precision header. When they take to the field to face Ukraine, England will hope Rooney can be their leader by example, achieving the untarnished progress his country has been waiting for.