Euro 2024: Should England start Phil Foden against Denmark?

Gareth Southgate’s England squad selection for Euro 2024 received widespread approval for being bold and courageous – and yet he is still revisiting a debate stretching back two decades.

It is a conversation that returns to the era when England’s then-manager Sven-Goran Eriksson failed to cash in what looked like a golden ticket stamped with the names of Steven Gerrard, Frank Lampard and Paul Scholes.

Eriksson’s star-struck approach led him to pack his team with England’s best individuals rather than shape a fully-functioning balanced side, a forced and flawed strategy that left the so-called ‘Golden Generation’ unfulfilled at international level while sweeping up major prizes regularly with their clubs.

It ended with a disillusioned Scholes, wasted on the left flank at Euro 2004 in Portugal, calling time early on his international career, a world-class operator with Manchester United marginalised by England.

And now there are hints of old arguments being raked over once more as England continue their Euro 2024 campaign against Denmark in Frankfurt on Thursday.

Southgate is not at the Eriksson stage yet – indeed he may never reach it – but he will be aware of the growing volume of the discussion around Manchester City’s Phil Foden, England’s young superstar Jude Bellingham and the make-up of his midfield elsewhere.

All the indications backstage in Frankfurt suggested Southgate will keep faith with Foden in the mainly left flank role he filled against Serbia, with Liverpool’s Trent Alexander-Arnold alongside Declan Rice in the centre.

It has not silenced the argument and the noise increased after Foden – the Footballer of the Year with 27 league goals as Manchester City secured a fourth successive title – cut a peripheral figure in England’s opening Euro 2024 win against Serbia in Gelsenkirchen, while Bellingham was the dominant personality in all aspects, scoring the decisive goal.