GARETH SOUTHGATE’S thinking was obvious with the inclusion of Jadon Sancho.
The England boss clearly believed the youngster had the kind of off-the-cuff magic needed against a Ukraine side sent out to be organised from the off.
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Southgate had been preaching a no-nonsense message to his players all week which clearly got through, courtesy of the early goal which brought the slightest of fist-punching but no wild celebration.
So calm was he, that Southgate hardly ventured out of the corner of the technical area, never needing to look back to consult his bench, gently offering words of advice to the players.
Southgate responded quickly to growing Ukraine threat down England’s right by switching Sterling there instead of Sancho to provide more cover for the exposed Walker late in the first half.
And he got just the start he wanted after break with the two early goals, wasting no time protecting Rice from a booking by introducing Henderson into the midfield.
Once the fourth went in it was a rush to get Phillips, Sterling and Shaw off.
Perfect tactics, perfect substitutions, perfect performance.
Andriy Shevchenko decided to double up down his left by using Vitaliy Mykolenko to his side at wing-back with Oleksandr Zinchenko just inside, aware of the threat England promised with Sancho down the right.
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Within four minutes he was striding back to his dugout questioning how all the planning had been undone by Harry Kane’s early goal – and spent the next few minutes hands on hips in the technical area.
The loss of defensive lynchpin Serhiy Kryvtsov saw Shevhchenko make a positive sub shuffling Mykolenko further back an introducing the more attacking Viktor Tsyhankov in a bid to change the pattern of play.
The change worked for a period as Ukraine started to penetrate down their left by outnumbering England out wide.
But within a minute of the second half starting England doubled their lead, leading the boss to stand palms out quizzing his players how they had got their marking so wrong.
When Kane headed in the third that was enough for Shevhchenko who trudged back to his seat and slumped almost forlorn in the dugout – where he spent much of the remainder of the game knowing his side had been outclassed.
