EURO 2020 preview: England’s clean sheet record under threat from Ukraine’s productive attack? – tactical analysis

Saturday brings us the EURO 2020 quarter-final between Ukraine and England which will be played at the Stadio Olimpico in Rome. England are coming into this match after beating Germany 2-0 at Wembley and they are yet to concede a goal in this tournament. At the other end, Ukraine defeated Sweden after scoring a 120th-minute winner in extra time. They have conceded six goals so far, but have superb attacking quality in the likes of the in-form Andriy Yarmolenko and Roman Yaremchuk, along with Oleksandr Zinchenko pulling the strings from midfield or out wide.

This tactical preview will provide us with England and Ukraines potential tactics and line-ups for this EURO 2020 clash. Through this analysis, we will get an insight into how each team can compete to earn a place in the semi-final. The winner will face the winner from the Czech Republic and Denmark game. 

Potential line-ups and formations

Gareth Southgate has a magnificent roster at his disposal and it is both good and bad. It is good because he can adjust his team to multiple formations and he has impressive attacking assets, but it is bad because whoever he picks for starting XI, his choice is always doubted by media and fans. 

Jordan Pickford will start between the posts, he didn’t have too much work in this tournament, but against Germany, he had two big saves after facing shots from Chelsea duo Kai Havertz and Timo Werner. Since Harry Maguire was cleared to play, Southgate decided to switch into a three-man defence with him taking place on left centre-back. John Stones occupies the central role while on the right centre-back is Kyle Walker. On the right wing-back, we expect Kieran Trippier, but Southgate has the good option in Reece James as well for that position. On the opposite side, we expect Luke Shaw who was one of the best players on the pitch against Germany which could give him an edge over Ben Chilwell who is cleared to play after passing COVID-19 protocols. We doubt Southgate will change midfield duo Kalvin Philips and Declan Rice and we fully expect them to start again. In the attacking trio, two players are safe to start: Raheem Sterling and Harry Kane. The third player was often rotated with Bukayo Saka, Mason Mount, Phil Foden and Jack Grealish while they also have at disposal Manchester United duo Marcus Rashford and Jadon Sancho who wasn’t used much so far. We will give the advantage to Jack Grealish since his substitution against Germany was crucial and he was involved in both England goals.