Howard Wilkinson will tonight hope to beat World Cup holders France by going back to the future. England's caretaker coach will seek to influence the shape of things to come with memories of things past.
If he succeeds and England play well, the FA will almost certainly ask Wilkinson to stay in charge of the squad not only for the European Championship qualifier against Poland in six weeks' time, but the summer qualifiers against Sweden and Bulgaria as well.
A disaster at Wembley, where France have so far been beaten four times without scoring, and Wilkinson will resume his job as the FA's technical director having been little more than an eight-day curiosity following Glenn Hoddle's dismissal.
Small wonder then that Wilkinson has turned to some familiar names performing in a familiar formation. The back three and wing-back system has perished with Hoddle.
Injuries to Gary Neville and Gareth Southgate, and Sol Campbell's stomach upset, may have forced Wilkinson's hand in the matter of personnel, but he was always likely to revert to a back four.
Thus England will face the French with a goalkeeper and defence largely made up of Arsenal and old lace. Martin Keown and Tony Adams will be the centre backs and the recall of Lee Dixon, 35 next month, is the nearest Wilkinson will get to confessing a belief in reincarnation.
Wilkinson effectively buried the case for wing backs yesterday, arguing that the way football has been opened up - by restricting passes back to goalkeepers, clamping down on tackles from behind and liberalising the offside law - has led to games becoming more stretched out between the penalty areas.
Zinedine Zidane, Didier Deschamps, Youri Djorkaeff and Arsenal's Emmanuel Petit will surely remind Wilkinson that England's chances of qualifying rest as much in midfield as in defence.
Tonight Wilkinson will put his faith in the Liverpool midfield partnership of Paul Ince and Jamie Redknapp. This will be Ince's first appearance for England since he was sent off in Sweden last September for a second yellow card and then compounded the offence by raving at the Italian referee.
If the opposition put on any sort of a performance, Wilkinson's back four may soon find themselves knee deep in Frenchmen as Laurent Blanc, Marcel Desailly, Lilian Thuram and others come through from the back. Poland are hardly in France's class but when they came to Wembley for a World Cup qualifier in 1996 they overwhelmed Hoddle's midfield only to be beaten by two goals from Alan Shearer.
Shearer and Michael Owen will resume their partnership tonight with Andy Cole and Robbie Fowler hoping to get on at some stage.
England (probable): Seaman; Dixon, Keown, Adams, Le Saux; Beckham, Redknapp, Ince, Anderton; Shearer, Owen.
France (probable): Barthez; Thuram, Blanc, Desailly, Lizarazu; Djorkaeff, Deschamps, Zidane, Petit; Dugarry; Anelka.
Referee: H Krug (Germany).
