Jordan Pickford weighs in on Lee Carsley’s prospects in the England dug-out after shambolic showing against Greece – and bizarrely claims Three Lions ‘weren’t far off’ in historic defeat

Jordan Pickford gave a vague answer over whether England’s limp 2-1 defeat to Greece will play a role in Lee Carsley’s future as head coach as the goalkeeper offered a rare defence of his side’s performance on Thursday evening. 

The England No1 conceded twice to goalscorer Vangelis Pavlidis on a historic night for the Hellenic visitors as they recorded their first-ever victory against the Three Lions at Wembley. 

Greece’s victory came with a layer of poignancy as they dedicated the win to the late George Baldock, the former international and Sheffield United player who died on Wednesday after drowning in his swimming pool. 

But there was just cause for celebration amid grief too, with the visitors the worthy winners against a shambolic England side who were outplayed. 

Carsley – who has been interim head coach in the wake of the departure of Gareth Southgate after this summer’s European Championship – will hope to bounce back and recover his grip on the role against Finland on Sunday. 

But Pickford was unable to say whether he believed the loss had dented his manager’s chances of taking on the role full-time. 

‘I’m not the hierarchy,’ Pickford said in the aftermath of the match, before conceding: ‘It’s never nice for a player or staff to get beat at Wembley.

‘We want to win every game we play when we put this shirt on and we didn’t. So we’ve got to keep going, dust ourselves down. What can we do better, what can we learn from and move on and get the result on Sunday?

‘You’ve always got to learn. You’re never going to be perfect, even when you’re winning games. You can learn a lot from this.

‘It’s about recovering well and getting ready for Sunday.’

But for all of Pickford’s talk about improving and moving on ahead of the international break’s second Nations League tie, the Everton shotstopper believes that the result belied England’s performance on the night. 

‘I think they just caught us on transitions a bit too much,’ Pickford continued. ‘I think we were a little bit open.

‘Sometimes in football it becomes a bit weird because a couple of scruffy passes actually gets you out and get us countered quite quick and they did that a few times. They played the long ball and won probably second balls more than we won tonight and that might have been the difference in the evening.

‘But the football we played was good and I know we always want to win but we didn’t.

‘We’ve got to dust ourselves down and look at what we can do a lot better and move on and win Sunday.

‘We weren’t far off. It was only two or three transitions which we got caught. Apart from that we controlled it but they got the better of us and we’re disappointed as a nation. It’s about how we get ready for the next game now.’

While Pickford might have thought it was a question of fine margins between England and their opponents, however, ITV pundit Roy Keane levelled a harsher judgement on the side – and singled out the goalkeeper for particular criticism. 

The former Manchester United man pointed out what he perceived as a lack of urgency in Pickford’s first-half performance, wondering whether his demeanour had an impact on his team-mates. 

‘That spreads a message throughout the team – the lack of concentration levels, the lack of urgency. 

‘What’s he doing? Do it quickly – not a good message from Pickford to send,’ he said, after Pickford lost possession far from home and needed Levi Colwill to bail him out.