Urgency, magic and Rashford: how England can beat the low block against Panama | Emma Hayes

E ngland’s goalless draw with Ghana reminded me of many games in my coaching career, when you’re facing a team who are extremely compact, positioned very low, and very well drilled. To break them down you need to play with more variety, better movement and – above all – urgency, and it took England too long to play with urgency. They can expect the same stubborn defending from Panama on Saturday. Therefore, in the buildup to their final group match, they will have been working on the key details needed to score against a low block. Paris Saint-Germain’s equaliser against Arsenal in this year’s men’s Champions League final is a good example. Arsenal were camped in their own half after the break and PSG patiently strangled them. You have to create more urgency without rushing. PSG won their penalty in that final not by lumping a ball into the box, but by creating a give-and-go around the penalty area. Their patient, methodological approach might be difficult for some to wrap their heads around. Whipping in crosses against a back four that has a wall of five players in front, with fewer than six or seven yards between them, is damn hard. As a coach, you want players to find ways to create chaos. You have to be patient and urgent, simultaneously. You want everyone playing like it’s the 90th minute much earlier and it took England too long to do that on Wednesday. You could see how frustrated Thomas Tuchel was becoming with the lack of movements; England were quite static. …