Three points, two goals, a clean sheet, some pleasingly upbeat football and, beyond having to take some culture-war flak, not much for Lee Carsley to grumble about from his England managerial debut on Saturday.
For the Football Association heads charged with deciding whether the interim has what it takes to wear the (track)suit full-time, though, there was, in a limited Irish performance, some cause for concern.
True, the hosts rallied after half-time in Dublin, preventing the thrashing that at the interval looked odds-on. By then, though, England were on Easy Street, following a mis-match of an opening 45 minutes, halfway through which they had had 86 per cent of the ball.
How many games exactly Carsley will be given remains TBC, but even if it is another five, covering the full Nations League group stage this autumn, England will not face opposition much stiffer than this: Republic of Ireland are ranked 58th in the world by FIFA, residents of the same ballpark as the other member of Group B2, Greece (54th) and Finland (63rd).
Ireland's level of resistance may well prove the low bar, but it still seems likely that judging Carsley’s credentials on these games will be like trying to gauge whether someone is fit to start the Monaco Grand Prix after a test drive on a road with no turns.
This run of fixtures is a delayed legacy of the low summer of Gareth Southgate’s reign more than two years ago, when a winless campaign saw England relegated from the Nations League’s top tier. Missing out on matches against the very best opposition was always going to be a frustration, whether it was Southgate or his successor attempting to mould a post-Euros team, but from the FA perspective now, February’s draw looks about as unhelpful as it might have been.
England could, for instance, have drawn the Norway of Martin Odegaard and Erling Haaland, or the Turkey team that thrilled in reaching the quarter-finals of Euro 2024. Slovenia would’ve provided a handy point of comparison, given they held Southgate’s team to a tepid 0-0 in the group stage in Germany. Even Ukraine, Georgia and Albania had their moments during the tournament. None of Finland, Ireland and Greece even qualified.
Of course, the Finns could turn up at Wembley on Tuesday night and rise to the occasion, rattle the cage. The form book suggests otherwise, though: they lost 3-0 in Greece on Saturday, shipped four away to Wales in March’s Euros play-offs and have lost at home to Kazakhstan in the last year.
None of this, of course, is Carsley’s fault and the 50-year-old may even be glad he is not auditioning against France or Spain. For now, he can do little more than meet the brief: win games, loosen chains, make himself a viable option, at the very least.
Against the stodge of this summer, “Carsball” already feels an antidote. It is worth remembering, though, that against this level of opposition outside major tournaments, Southgate’s England rarely struggled either.
