Perhaps the strangest moment of England’s latest amble through this qualifying process came an hour or so after the final whistle, deep in the bowels of Wembley, as the Slovenia manager, Srecko Katanec, and his official spokesman, Matjaz Krajnik, tried to explain what had gone wrong with their preparations and, in the process, highlighted the bureaucracy of the people in Uefa blazers.
Slovenia’s team had been staying at the Wembley Hilton and the clue really is in the name. At most, it is 50 metres from the stadium, in a pedestrianised part of the complex. “We wanted to walk,” Katanec explained.
Yet when Uefa got wind of it Slovenia were told it was forbidden and could mean being charged with disciplinary breaches. According to the rules, teams have to travel by bus and Slovenia were informed the traffic around Wembley could be so jammed they would have to leave 30 minutes spare to drive away from the hotel on Lakeside Way, turn right on to the A479 and then back up on themselves on Engineers Way to the stadium, roughly 300 yards in total.
“It was ridiculous,” Krajnik said. “The stadium is 50 metres from the hotel. Yet we were told we had to leave early because apparently there could have been a traffic jam. It took us seven minutes on the bus.” And the problem, according to Katanec, was that setting off so early disrupted their thinking. “We had half an hour after we arrived when the players had nothing to do, it was not how we planned it at all.”
It was an odd footnote to the slightly unorthodox day when Wayne Rooney won his 100th England cap, Wembley watched a football match with NFL markings still visible on the pitch and Roy Hodgson’s team waited until the 55th minute before managing their first shot on target, then rattled in three goals in the space of 13 minutes.
It was some response to Jordan Henderson’s own goal but, equally, these are strange moments for Hodgson’s men. Everyone has known since the opening win in Switzerland they are all but qualified and for long spells this game had a going-through-the-motions vibe not particularly helpful for Hodgson when he is looking to improve the team’s sharpness.
Hodgson said he was planning to make changes for the friendly against Scotland in Glasgow and Joe Hart’s return to Manchester City is an early indicator of his plans. The England manager also revealed that Stewart Downing, with a twisted knee, had been unavailable against Slovenia but should be fine for Tuesday’s game and “that’s good news because I would like to see him in an England shirt at some stage”. This time Hodgson has the luxury of being able to use six substitutes rather than three, but it would be wrong to assume he will experiment too wildly. “I am going to need some experienced players on the field. I can’t just make wholesale changes.”
Hodgson said what all England managers say in these moments about it being a test of character for his team in front of a raucous Scottish crowd. Yet a crowd has never scored a goal. Footballers at this level should never wilt because of the background noise and the more important message will be to match Scotland for sheer commitment and use the ball more effectively than they did against Slovenia. For that, Hodgson declined to blame the state of the pitch after its latest American football match but he is unimpressed that three more are planned next year, including one five days before England’s home game against Estonia.
Wembley will also host two Rugby World Cup matches and Hodgson questioned again whether the Football Association is thinking enough about his team. “To be fair, they agreed when I said I was going to get questions on the pitch and they couldn’t expect me to defend the decisions made by the commercial side of the enterprise, and had to allow me to speak as a football person. You can’t expect me as a football coach to make claims that Wembley should be used for NFL and rugby. But on the other hand I am pragmatic enough to realise this is a factor in Wembley life.
“I can say only that I work for the FA. They make the decisions they have to make. They have financial decisions to make but, as a football person, I have to be in the camp that would like to see this place lying fallow virtually all the year apart from seven or eight occasions. Unfortunately, it would be naive of me to think it is ever going to happen. The fact is I don’t have the problem of making Wembley go round as they do and I have to accept these situations.”
