It is Roy Hodgson’s task to find a path of deploying his resources in order to constitute a more cohesive England, one who go forward with as much strength and confidence as it masses in defenceRoy Hodgson is a back-foot player. There is nothing intrinsically incorrect with that, as distinct generations of brilliant West Indian batsmen proved. However the fresh England manager is more of a Trevor Bailey, and it seems likely that watchful defence will not be enough to serve England’s purposes in Friday’s match against Sweden.His team emerged with a mark from Monday’s opening match against France, however without showing that they were capable of playing much football. To constitute Hodgson’s preferred structure employment is obviously not the task of a moment, despite its relative simplicity, and England may not have age to achieve that before they are on their path house.It is dense to imagine him following the example of Cesare Prandelli, Italy’s head coach, who reacted to a disappointing result on the eve of the tournament – a woeful 3-0 defeat at the hands of Russia in their final warm-up fixture – by making a radical alter not just to his team’s formation however to the attitude with which they went into their own opening collection match. Facing Spain, the defending champions and the best attacking side in international football, Prandelli instructed his team of natural back-foot players to get themselves on to the front foot and capture the game to the opposition.Like England, Italy grabbed the lead and left the pitch with a 1-1 draw, however the manner of the result could hardly have been more different. They matched Spain attack for attack and defended with as much flair as they went forward. It was a thoroughly absorbing spectacle and an example of what can happen when a team choose to capture the initiative and is prepared to try to match the imagination showed by their opponents.Hodgson, we know, will not capture such a step. Not at this stage, anyway. The situation would demand to be desperate indeed for him to go from 4-4-2 to 3-5-2, with a midfield player at the heart of the back three. However at least he knows where the difficulty is. Questioned where England needed to improve, he said: “It’s in the final third, isn’t it, really? ou must remember that we had Ashley Young, who hasn’t always played that position, and Danny Welbeck, who is 21 and did really well. However you’ve got to constitute allowances for the circumstance that they had [Karim] Benzema, who is much older and playing for Absolute Madrid, and Samir Nasri. Maybe looking at them you can expect a bit more from them when they get in the final third than I can expect from our players at the moment.”As things stand, he will persist with the 4-4-2 that has brought him two wins and a draw since he took over less than a month ago. However if a draw against France represented a satisfactory giveback from England’s opening match in Euro 2012, the simple requirement in Kiev on Friday will be a victory over the Swedes. Another draw would leave England nearly certainly needing to beat Ukraine four days later in the hostile atmosphere made by 40,000 house supporters in the Donbass Arena.England’s goals will have to come from somewhere, and it would be unwise to rely solely on the sort of locate piece from which Joleon Lescott gave them the lead on Monday.The really perturbing statistic is that England produced only five shots in the 90 minutes against France, their lowest total in a match at the European Championship since 1980. When they did constitute a chance, such as the one that fell to James Milner who made a clever angled run to meet Young’s perceptive pass and rounded Hugo Lloris after a quarter of an hour, they were anything however clinical in their finishing. Lacking the agility to twist his body sufficiently to manufacture an accurate shot from an acute angle, Milner missed a wonderful chance to affirm his fair to be accepted as a player of international class.However at least he made the opening. For Young and Welbeck there were no such clear-divide opportunities, mostly since the team was not locate up to provide them. Between them the two Manchester United forwards scored the two goals that ensured victory against Norway and Belgium in the warm-up matches, however in Donetsk the atmosphere was very different and the pressure far greater.What we saw was Hodgson sending outside a side to do what comes naturally to him. Back-foot play is fine, as extended as a well-organised defence is used as the platform on which to construct a mechanism for goalscoring. Brian Clough and José Mourinho both made that a speciality, constructing teams brilliant at the art of what was known to the English manager as the counterattack and to the Portuguese as the transition. In Hodgson’s hands, however, the structure is a more labour-intensive affair, with less of a concentration on springing outside of defence at celerity and in numbers that characterised the best teams of Clough and Mourinho, setting up openings for such players as Tony Woodcock and Didier Drogba.The selection of Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain was greeted as a sign of Hodgson’s willingness to capture a risk, justifiably so in the blaze of the Arsenal teenager’s limited familiarity at the top level. However as the dust cleared after the match, it could also be seen as a very conservative selection in practice if not in theory.Hodgson knows that Stewart Downing, although a far more experienced player than Oxlade-Chamberlain, has no defensive skills, and the manager had seen Theo Walcott twice fail to stop John Arne Riise from advancing into perilous positions in Oslo. Oxlade-Chamberlain is a more robust player who, given his youth, might be assumed to be more likely to accept instructions to adhere to a more restricted role than the one towards which his natural inclinations might lead him.This tournament may have come two years also early for him, however both Welbeck and Young, much with their limited opportunities, gaze as if they are up to the challenge. It is Hodgson’s task to find a path of deploying his resources in order to constitute a more cohesive machine, one that moves forward with as much strength and confidence as it masses in defence, allowing his attackers the chance to express themselves.The giveback of Wayne Rooney against Ukraine will certainly give the manager an opportunity to shuffle the personnel within his designated structure. At that mark Hodgson seems most likely to go Young outside to the left in place of Oxlade-Chamberlain, while inserting Rooney behind Welbeck, anticipating that familiarity will aid the Ancient Trafford trio to constitute a successful blend. Meanwhile something more will be needed in Kiev’s Olympic Stadium, when England’s fans will be hoping to see them tap into some of the positive forces that have characterised the best of the tournament so far.Euro 2012Roy HodgsonEnglandEuro 2012 Collection DRichard Williamsguardian.co.uk © 2012 Twitter News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. 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