Bukayo Saka gives England the platform for glory... but with Gareth Southgate sitting on his hands and Harry Kane ready for a sunbed they look like a car rolling on three wheels, writes IAN LADYMAN

England are the football team that has forgotten how to play but has also forgotten how to lose. It may yet be a curious combination that takes Gareth Southgate and his team to the final of Euro 2024 in Berlin.

When England travelled to Germany, this is where we hoped and maybe even expected to be with a week of football left. Deep in yet another tournament under Southgate and well positioned to justify their position as one of the favourites for this competition.

This was not how we expected them to travel, though. Under Southgate’s uncertain management, England continue to look like a car rolling on three wheels.

This has been the worst England tournament performance since Euro 2016 in terms of the football they have played. Here against Switzerland, they started brightly under Southgate’s new 3-5-2 system but faded once again. For far too many of these 120 minutes in Dusseldorf, England played pauper’s football and the record shows that from five 90 minute games of football against Iceland, Serbia, Denmark, Slovenia, Slovakia and Switzerland, they have won just once.

But still England have a platform to push for glory and that in itself is something to savour and appreciate. Despite the circumstances, we should be thankful. Moreover, it is surely impossible that yet another get out of jail performance here will fail to give them something to build on and to work on ahead of a semi-final in Dortmund on Wednesday night.

Nobody can question England’s mettle, for sure. Their football was poor once again here but for the second game running they scored a late goal of real quality to save themselves. That’s what big game players can do and England have plenty.

Against Slovakia, it had been Jude Bellingham. This time it was the marvellous Bukayo Saka. Then, when it came to the penalties, five England players held their nerve immaculately to execute perfectly. They deserve credit for that. It’s hard enough to win football matches playing well, quite something else to do it when you aren’t.

That is pretty much where the good news starts and ends, however, and what is increasingly certain is that if England are to push for the ultimate glory in Berlin next Sunday, they are going to have to do it without an awful lot of in-game help from their manager.

This was Southgate’s 100th game in charge of England and he continues to look a little bit like a coach who is ready for the end of the road. Those of us who have followed his journey from caretaker manager to a man who has taught English players how to stay in big tournaments would argue that he deserves a successive appearance in a European Championship final to cement his legacy and spare him from those who simply decided right from the outset that they didn’t like him.

But it’s an unavoidable fact that Southgate has had as poor a tournament as any of his players. He is lucky to still be here and deep down he will know it.

There was conviction about Southgate’s selection for this game. He knew he had to do something to shake his players from the torpor that was threatening to suffocate them. A miracle goal from Bellingham had dragged England out of the cart in Gelsenkirchen last Sunday and Southgate knew he couldn’t rely on another.

There was some brightness about England for a while. They were better. Saka was excellent from the outset and it was joyful to see the Arsenal player end this evening with a huge smile writ large across his boyish face. His penalty finally will have erased the memory of the one he missed on that awful night at Wembley in the final of Euro 2020. The 22-year-old is one of the shining lights of English football.

With Bellingham and Phil Foden playing closer together behind Harry Kane, England had some purpose and some possession and some forward thrust. But it didn’t last. The first half came and went without a shot on target and by the time Switzerland took the lead in the 75th minute, Southgate’s team still hadn’t managed one.

And it was during this period of the game where once again we had found Southgate sitting on his hands. Kane had laboured up front all afternoon. Frankly, the England captain looks heavy and leggy and ready for a sunbed. Inexplicably he stayed on. England had also lacked any kind of balance down the left where the selection of Kieran Trippier robbed them of an outlet. It is not, of course, the Newcastle player’s natural side.

But not until Switzerland scored and the exit once again loomed large did Southgate summon his substitutes. Belatedly three arrived at once and within seconds of Cole Palmer, Luke Shaw and Eberechi Eze ambling on to the field, Saka swung his left foot at the ball and saw it fizz across goal and in off the far post. At that point England’s last three tournament shots on target had actually gone in. One here and two against Slovakia. 

There has been a certain magnetism to the way England have stumbled through this competition. It’s certainly hard to take your eyes off it simply because it’s been so peculiar. It’s also hard to ignore what we have seen, though. Towards the end of extra-time England’s goalkeeper Jordan Pickford was wasting time and waiting for penalties. With good reason, it transpired.

So can this go on? Can England continue to play so far below their levels and continues to progress? Absolutely they can. We have learned that already. England have looked like a team waiting to be beaten all summer but the longer they go without taking that decisive blow, the more they will believe that this may finally be their year. Plenty of other big fish have gone home yet England are still swimming.

For years we came home from these tournaments feeling that we had left something out on the field, that we were somehow destined never to get what we deserve. This time it feels different and maybe it’s simply a wave that England simply should ride.

Southgate’s team haven’t played remotely well for a whole game here in Germany and they are now only one of four teams left. Just imagine what could happen over these next seven days if they finally do get it all together. We wait and we hope.