The reimagining of Kalvin Phillips

England did something good! But not just that, it was thoughtful and felt relatively sustainable. This wasn’t a flash of individual brilliance that put Croatia to the sword, but a very good team performance that did the job very well.

A key part of England’s plan was the use of Kalvin Phillips in midfield. It was arguably some of the finest bits of coaching and management Gareth Southgate has produced at national level.

At Leeds, Phillips plays as the deepest midfielder. The anchor in front of the back four. In possession (very generally speaking), he will collect the ball from the centre backs and look build play. Out of it, he is the screen in front of the Whites’ defence.

But being a Marcelo Bielsa side, it’s never quite that simple. With the Argentine’s hell for leather man marking approach in open play, this means that Phillips will sometimes be found hounding an opponent up the pitch, rather than in a traditional defensive position in front of the back four.

Then there is, of course, the extreme levels of fitness the Bielsa demands of all his players. Phillips, like his club mates, is in extremely good shape.

Southgate has taken these skills - a willingness and adeptness at pressing, and the physical fitness to cope with it - and applied them to a more shuttling box-to-box role for England. And it worked an absolute treat against Croatia on Sunday.

Declan Rice sat deep and screened the defence, helping to keep an eye on Luka Modric who was lurking in that area of the pitch. Mason Mount did exactly what you expect - linked play nicely, then pressed diligently and smartly. And Phillips hared around the pitch, giving Croatia’s midfield no chance to settle.

Phillips’s role seemed to focus somewhat on Mateo Kovacic, harrying the Chelsea man before he could have a chance to carry the ball forward like he can do so well. There were also some excellent ‘smart’ fouls that would have made Fernandinho proud, if he was watching and for some reason had paternal instincts towards Phillips.

This was a key part in shutting down Croatia’s main (and pretty much only) threat in their stellar midfield. Kovacic, Modric and Marcelo Brozavic barely had a chance to get going.

But it wasn’t just out of possession that Phillips contributed for England. The driving run the Leeds man made to set up Raheem Sterling’s equaliser typified Phillips’s afternoon.

As Leeds’s midfield anchor, Phillips doesn’t really do much of this kind of thing at club level, but he evoked his more box-to-box (the position he originally played before Bielsa transformed him into a ‘No4’) instincts to drive into dangerous areas and make space for himself and teammates in possession.

It’s also worth remembering that Phillips is an excellent passer of the ball, with a superb range of long passing that he regularly displays for Leeds to set a quick tempo for attacks. This accuracy and range of passing helped England a lot in possession.

So is Phillips the man to go with against Scotland as well?

The Scots’ biggest strength is obviously their left flank, and Phillips operating in that more right hand midfield role could help shut this down. Kieran Tierney will be pushing up from left centre back to support Andy Robertson, so whoever is playing at right back will probably need a hand.

From this, you could also probably make a case for moving Sterling to the right flank rather than the left. The Man City man showed far more defensive diligence than his club mate Phil Foden, who had sparkling moments in attack without anything major quite coming off.

This would free up a space on England’s left side, where Jack Grealish might be a good option to try and unpick what will likely be quite a defensive Scottish set up.

In fact, this is the great strength in England’s squad. While some areas like centre back may lack a little (although Tyrone Mings put in a fine display against Croatia), the Three Lions are blessed with abundance of riches in attack.

This gives Southgate the option to switch attacking players around for different opponents to exploit weaknesses, without really compromising the overall strength of his attack.

There are a few ‘good’ conundrums for Southgate to dwell on as he works out how to exploit Scotland.

To be honest, he probably already at least has a very strong idea of who will be playing, and has a lot of kudos banked as his initially controversial selections against Croatia paid off.