Graphic: Formations, bets and every last statistic

Asked to explain the title of his most influential novel, The Naked Lunch, William S. Burroughs described it as the frozen moment when everyone sees what is on the end of every fork. Steve McClaren, the England head coach, would appear to have experienced his Naked Lunch moment yesterday. Faced with a game in which the wrong result would leave him unlikely to survive one more night in his job, let alone one more tournament, he made three of the most drastic decisions of his managerial career.

McClaren awarded a battlefield promotion to his third-choice goalkeeper, Scott Carson, leaving out the increasingly unreliable Paul Robinson, who despite a rash of errors has kept more clean sheets than any goalkeeper in the European Championship qualifying process. He preferred Gareth Barry to the returning Owen Hargreaves, widely agreed to be the revelation of England’s World Cup campaign in 2006. Most significantly, he dropped David Beckham, whose performance against Austria in a friendly on Friday convinced few beyond his fan club that injury and the reduced challenge of Major League Soccer had left him fit for purpose as an international footballer.

In doing so, McClaren showed greater readiness than many of his predecessors to embrace the boldness necessary to succeed in tournament football. He needs one point against Croatia to take England to the finals and, if he gets it, he will be able to add a penchant for forthright decision-making to his CV.

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BACKGROUND

• England drop Beckham and Robinson

• McClaren demonstrates courage for art of survival

• Gerrard urges fans to be twelfth man

• Defence called on to compile case for the untried

BACKGROUND

• Croatia driven by lure of Premier League

• Playing for a draw . . . a history of success

• Ten judgment days

Multimedia

• Live: England v Croatia, 2000GMT

• Fanzone: Lions need to be tamed

It helps if one believes that McClaren is correct in all three calls, but even those who are worried by the inclusion of Shaun Wright-Phillips on the right wing or a goalkeeper making his competitive international debut in a game in which one mistake could be calamitous, must surely concede that here is a head coach at last confronting his problems head on.

Few thought that McClaren would have the courage to reject Beckham a second time and he has proved them wrong. Many believed he would stick with the experienced Robinson, even after his errors in Moscow. McClaren has confounded again. Operating 90 minutes from the prospect of dismissal appears to have focused his mind.

There must have been a moment in Vienna on Friday when he looked at Beckham, shorn of energy adequately to protect Micah Richards, his full back, and pronounced him a risk not worth taking. He must have reviewed Robinson’s part in Russia’s second goal several times and concluded that that was his last chance. Asked whether a match such as this brought out the ruthless streak in a manager, McClaren agreed. “It has got to be for the good of the team, though” he said, “but when it is a big game, big decisions get made.”

Few bigger than discarding Beckham, however, even if many neutrals agree he does not look capable of playing 90 minutes against a strong European team. Required to identify whether he was a conservative manager or a risk-taker, McClaren spoke more warmly of the virtues of pragmatism and this would appear to be a decision that owes much to strategy.

“A manager’s job is to be pragmatic and realistic, to know what you have and how it can work for you,” he said. “I recall games in knockout competitions with Middlesbrough when we were three down at half-time, needing to take a risk, and it has worked. This time, it is not about David Beckham or any individual, it is not about it being one player’s time. This is about the team ethic. It is up to them all.”

Croatia play a tight back four and tight midfield four and, with Michael Owen out, McClaren’s decision to leave Peter Crouch on his own up front and have attacking midfield players joining him has one obvious flaw. A congested central area could make it difficult for Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard to get through and Wright-Phillips has been preferred to Beckham for his ability to stretch the play wide. If he can pull defenders out of position, the space will open up for the midfield goalscorers to exploit, particularly if Joe Cole is also making inroads on the left.

It is surely no coincidence that England’s attacking formation of 4-3-3 — it will naturally evolve into 4-5-1 when defending, a clean sheet guaranteeing McClaren qualification whether his team score or not — contains Chelsea players in three out of five forward positions. It is a style of play familiar to all at Stamford Bridge, not least England’s most consistent midfield goalscorer, Lampard, and the two wingers.

In this line-up Beckham becomes an impact substitute and that is all his present status warrants. No doubt if England trail with 15 minutes to go he will be called upon to replicate his saviour-of-a-nation act from the game against Greece in 2001 and, if he succeeds, it will be said that he has rescued the fool McClaren, but this demonstrates a wilful misunderstanding of his revised role.

Nobody claimed that Ole Gunnar Solskjaer regularly saved Sir Alex Ferguson at Manchester United. It was, instead, widely acknowledged that his talents were shrewdly utilised to affect the game in its late stages. Why cannot this be Beckham’s mission, too? When McClaren left him out of the squad in August 2006, his supporters asked why it had to be all or nothing. Why could he not be just a squad member? It seems rather inconsistent to protest now that McClaren has learnt to see him that way. “Beckham is one of the best players on the right and to have him around is invaluable,” McClaren said.

As for Carson, he was hardly given the opportunity to play himself in against a limp Austria side so the conclusion can only be that McClaren decided he can no longer stake his future on Robinson. He is known to lean heavily on the advice of his goalkeeping coach, Ray Clemence, so one must presume there has been a change in attitude there, too. Recalling Hargreaves was a temptation but he has barely been available for England in this campaign — not since signing for Manchester United, anyway — and Barry has thrived in his place.

The bottom line for McClaren is that, given a lifeline by Israel’s victory over Russia, there can be no mitigating circumstances if he fails now. England have needed a point to qualify for a big tournament on nine occasions and have progressed nine times. It will be impossible for the coach to justify his continued fitness for the job if he does not go through.

Against that, his choices in this evening’s game and before — dropping and then recalling Lampard, for instance — suggest he is going further than Sven-Göran Eriksson did towards turning England into a true meritocracy.

“The only possible ethic is to do what one wants to do,” Burroughs wrote. It has taken long enough, but, in one sense at least, McClaren has got it right. For this, he deserves a good result and, if he gets that, a proper crack at the tournament in the summer.