WHILE SATURDAY’S FIXTURE WAS far removed from the anaemic exercise anticipated by many, it was not until last night that England confronted the first competitive action of their post-season tour. Players and staff made their way to the Bronx to watch the New York Yankees host the Boston Red Sox and shudder at the passion of baseball’s sharpest rivalry. The contrast will have been unavoidable.

Friendly matches seldom stir the soul, but there were elements to be admired in Soldier Field Stadium, from the goals of Kieran Richardson, a healthy crowd and inflicting a first home defeat on the United States for 27 months. The game was feisty, but context was crucial; of those present, only Ashley and Joe Cole are expected to start next summer’s World Cup finals. In the Windy City, everything else was hot air.

Zat Knight, a second-half substitute, admitted to being “very shocked” to have received a call-up and given that the Fulham defender — officially the tallest man to represent England — is arguably Sven-Göran Eriksson’s tenth-choice centre half, his surprise was understandable. Richardson, who became the first debutant to score twice since David Johnson in 1975, is not even guaranteed first-team football at his club.

In the parlance of America’s national pastime, nobody struck out, while Richardson and Michael Carrick stepped up to the plate and performed sturdily, but the team was hardly star-spangled and the end product debatable. If nothing else, it proved that Eriksson has a hungry secondary strata of talent from which to draw, but if there may be long-term benefits to this 2-1 victory, little is altered for the immediate future.

Richardson would not have begun against the US had Stewart Downing not succumbed to a knee injury last week and if the 20-year-old is now level in the pecking order with Middlesbrough’s exciting young winger, Joe Cole, Shaun Wright-Phillips and, when fit, Kieron Dyer, still stand between him and a regular position on England’s flanks. A strained hamstring is likely to preclude his involvement against Colombia tomorrow.

Richardson, who excelled in a recent loan spell for West Bromwich Albion, is discussing a new contract with Manchester United. “I have not spoken to Sir Alex Ferguson about him,” Eriksson said, “but I don’t think he has taken him back to sit on the bench all season. If he plays as well in the Premiership, he will have a lot of games and we want him playing more or less regularly.” Cristiano Ronaldo and Ryan Giggs may take exception to that.

Time on the pitch is the nub of the issue. “I need regular football and that’s the key,” Richardson said. “If you’re not playing in the first team, the manager can’t see how you’re progressing, so hopefully next season I can be doing that for United. The left side for England is probably the one place up for grabs and playing for West Brom has improved me.” Eriksson warned that he is “not yet ” ready for a central role.

The cheeky manner in which Richardson pushed aside Jermaine Jenas to fizz a left-foot free kick beyond Kasey Keller in the fourth minute recalled the teenager whose cocky attitude once earned him aggrieved tackles at United’s training ground, but his confidence is now more grounded. “You have to have that arrogance,” Steve McClaren, who worked with him at Old Trafford, said. “It’s an asset, but you have to control it and he’ll learn.”

His second goal was a result of a fine turn and pass by Joe Cole, who, after a tortuous introduction to international football, has adapted with supreme ease to this level since imposing himself at Chelsea. “Richardson has made this tour worthwhile,” Eriksson said, but if he does not participate in the Giants Stadium, there will be frustration, too, given the premature departure of Downing and Peter Crouch’s struggle for availability.

Carrick, who had not played for his country since 2001, was composed in midfield, and Alan Smith was committed, if not potent, in attack, but those who regressed included Glen Johnson, whose brittle temperament was mirrored by his snatched use of possession — “I know what I’m doing,” the Chelsea defender said, which is a trifle alarming — and his namesake Andrew, who scurried across the pitch without seriously enhancing his reputation.

As is traditional in these affairs, the second half was leggy and disfigured by substitutions. The US, who had struck the woodwork through Landon Donovan, mustered consolation when David James cleared a header from Carlos Bocanegra, of Fulham, into the path of Clint Dempsey and England degenerated into conceding free kicks and mistreating the ball. The result could be interpreted as a useful knock, if not quite a home run.

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