England's night ends in defeat to Lukas Podolski's Germany but not without promise

Germany 1 England 0: The night belonged to someone else, but Gareth Southgate can take positives from his first night as the national team's permanent manager

Lukas Podolski's thunderous strike consigned Gareth Southgate's side to defeat (Getty)

England had stumbled in on someone else’s party and the way the guest of honour effortlessly shaped the script to his own ends certainly took the sheen off what, by most measures, was a beginning of promise for Gareth Southgate’s England. Lukas Podolski’s finish was a measure of the uncomplicated and game-changing genius Germany bring: a standard to aim for.

What we witnessed from England was more prosaic: a performance of intelligence and creation in which Southgate demonstrated a tactical imagination we have not seen in our international manager for years.

Though we seem to be locked in an eternal process of looking for signs, there should be frustration at chances spurned, rather than desolation at the size of the mountain ahead.

With the caveat that the home side were operating well beneath optimum intensity, Michael Keane did enough to suggest he can be a regular presence in England’s defence: surer in possession and less inclined to complicate the game than Manchester City’s John Stones.

Though not totally consistent in his passing, Jake Livermore buzzed around the midfield effectively. And though Southgate said he’d had to “walk” the players through a formation built around three-man defence, it played to his squad’s strengths. The wing backs allowed Adam Lallana and Dele Alli – the night’s outstanding players – to tuck in and cause danger.

Dele Alli was guilty of missing England's best first-half chance (Getty)

A puzzle resides in where Jamie Vardy fits into a team which plays the ball on the floor. He was an isolated figure in a team whose trigger reaction is not to deliver the long ball he wants to seize upon. Harry Kane is more likely to make more out of this system.

Southgate’s own willingness to take tactical risks offered the greatest sign of something new, though. We were watching the first three-man England defence since that desperate night in Zagreb’s Stadion Maksimir against Croatia, nine years ago, which brought down the curtain crashing down on Steve McClaren’s unhappy tenure.

The size of the gamble was compounded by the presence of Keane – an England debutante who has been playing in a four-man Burnley defence all season – in the three-man unit.

Michael Keane coped admirably on his international debut (Getty)

In Keane’s performance, which included one fine block, there was evidence of the value attached to having a manager who has handled his players at under-21 level, too, and knows them. Southgate observed afterwards that the 24-year-old had “played in under-21s at full back and centre back so the system was going to suit him no problem.”

It does not seem to be clutching at straws to say that the adaptability is a part of the modernity which England have lacked as Germany have soared above them in the past 15 years. Southgate said he’d decided on the system six weeks ago, having seen Germany “pin teams back and you end up with six at the back if you play with the system we have played in the past.

I didn’t want to sit there and take pressure all night.” This took us a long way from the Roy Hodgson decision making which sometimes seemed so on-the-hoof. Rooney the England central midfielder materialised in the last warm-up game before Euro 2016, remember.

So yes, this image of England out on the field of play was a more modern affair: certainly more so than the substantial English contingent offered more of that wretched singing about ’50 German bombers’ which was a soundtrack to last summer’s European championships.

The night belonged to Podolski, who leaves the international stage (Getty)

For as long as there is not clinical finishing – a desire to drive opposition into the dust – the optimism is built on a hypothesis. Adam Lallana’s decision to shoot rather than level for Jamie Vardy after a first breakaway was the correct one, as the Leicester striker had not provided the kind of movement to free him from German attention. Vardy did not have the faculty to create an option, when the moment arrived, seconds before Lallana went solo and struck the post

The second outstanding opportunity delivered poor finishing by Dele Alli – a significant minus against the positives stacked up in his name. One-on-one, staring at the whites in Marc-Andre ter Stegen’s eyes, he struck the ball straight at him. Against opposition of this standard, it was a miss of criminal proportions.

Podolski stepped up to delive what England were missing, though the sight of Joe Hart offering congratulations to the player after the ball had sailed past him was not welcome. The full-time whistle is the time for that. Winners hate to concede, whoever’s show it might be.

Germany (4-4-2): Ter Stegen; Kimmich, Hummels, Rudiger, Hector; Brandt (Schurrle 60), Kroos, Weigl (Can 66), Sane; Werner (Muller 76), Podolski (Rudy 84).

England (3-4-2-1): Hart; Keane, Cahill, Smalling (Stones 84); Walker, Dier, Livermore (Ward-Prowse 83), Bertrand (Shaw 83); Alli (Lingard 70), Lallana (Redmond 65); Vardy (Rashford 70).

Referee: D Skomina (Slovenia)