It could prove to be Gareth Southgate’s most important decision. It will probably be his least. Either way, he has to make it: Ivan Toney or Ollie Watkins?
Harry Kane is the first name on England’s team sheet, so there’s arguably no need to care about his understudy. Ultimately, it all hinges on the great man’s ankle, for which I can give a concise history. 2016-19: brittle. 2020-2023: fine. March 2024: sore. Sadly for Southgate, a Kane-less international break wasn’t painless. England’s difficulty to convert chances was a reminder of his importance, no, necessity, to winning in Germany this summer. That’s inspiring if you consider the clinical difference he makes, bleak if you consider the drop-off. No surprise then if Southgate wishes never to call on Watkins or Toney to lead the line this summer. But one more twist of an ankle thrusts the chosen understudy onto the biggest stage.
Watkins is the player you’d go for if you were a hiring manager writing a report to justify a selection to your superiors. He has more goals this season than everyone except Erling Haaland. He is the main man for a club competing for a top 4 spot and a European trophy. At the other end of the table, Toney’s return to action hasn’t had the sort of impact envisioned by his adoring Brentford fans – the same fans who admirably ignore their star player’s ambivalence towards the club. In fact, all he’s done since serving an eight month betting ban is score a controversial free kick, fantasise about playing for Real Madrid and befriend Neil Maupay. A redemption arc could inspire a sequel to the National Theatre’s Dear England, but as it stands Ivan Toney is definitely not the archetypal do-gooder that befits the Southgate era. He’s a red flag player, and the last thing Southgate wants to do right now is concern himself with flags again.
On Tuesday all it took was a composed penalty and some slick interchanges for Toney to win me over. Some sucker I must be. This is probably what it’s like supporting Brentford. Such is his charm, I was rooting for him to do well in the same way one would a Westminster outsider on polling day. If an England call-up is like becoming a Cabinet minister, Toney missed out on the classic route of student union, law firm, campaign trail, dispatch box. As a youngster, his parent club Newcastle sent him on the world’s most boring road trip, visiting Barnsley, Shrewsbury, Scunthorpe and Wigan before finally abandoning him at Peterborough. His big moment came when Brentford bought him to replace the upwardly mobile Ollie Watkins – though Toney would argue his actual big moment will come when he’s finally airlifted out of the Gtech Community Stadium to sign for Arsenal.
Like Jamie Vardy and Ian Wright, Ivan Toney belongs to a line of players who were never meant to play for England, but whose grit and character got them there in the end. Even England’s record goal scorer laboured in the Championship for a while, unlikely to ever break into Tottenham’s first team. There’s clearly something about that kind of apprenticeship, away from elite, data-driven systems, which adds an edge to a marksman’s craft on the global stage. It could be that their footballing idiosyncrasies can catch an international opponent off guard. Leonardo Bonucci has never seen such rizz! Mats Hummels, have you ever come across a striker with that much dog in him?
Toney gave an experienced Belgian defence a harder time than Watkins gave a Brazilian defence who’d only just met each other. The signs were that the Brentford man is more adept at hold-up play, liberates Jude Bellingham and Phil Foden, and is generally just a nasty nuisance for defenders. Watkins is a fine player, but the devastating efficiency he has shown this year has come at the sharp end of a well-oiled machine under the instruction of a meticulous coach. He’s too polished for the more primal arena of international football.
England’s group contains three unfashionable but workmanlike teams. To progress, Southgate’s boys will need to break them down and win ‘the hard way’. Kane cannot be replicated, but his back-up must be a distinctive and complementary alternative. When there’s no space to run into behind Serbia’s low block, Watkins is ineffective.
Give them Toney instead. He’ll wind up Nikola Melenkovic into conceding a penalty, or cushion the perfect header into Kane’s path, or show no regard for the referee’s vanishing spray. It’s all about those marginal gains, which Southgate should really make a habit of caring about if this summer is partly an audition for his potential post-Euros day job.
Chris Perrin 