England were the feel good story of the World Cup, but the Premier League thrives on friction

Odd times for the Premier League. It has returned after a World Cup in which England did pretty well, and that’s not normal. Even stranger, England’s success — both onfield and off — stemmed in large part from the self-contained, modest, distinctly un-Premier League fashion in which they conducted themselves.

Minimal hype. Minimal bluster. An almost complete lack of cutting about the place as if they owned it. Sky Sports, who have done as much as anybody to create the noisy attention-seeking thing that is this league, tried their best to link the two together on Friday night. Viewers of Manchester United against Leicester City were assured that the “feel-good factor” might carry over. By the time we got close to kick off, it was sounding a little desperate.

But hey, perhaps it might! Harry Maguire and Raheem Sterling and John Stones have gone back to their respective parishes — they’ve come home, if you like — and perhaps the goodwill has gone with them. Maybe it will percolate out through the league, and this season will be one long, warm, affirming hug where everybody does their best and does home happy. Or if not happy, at least not relentlessly angry.

Maybe not. The Premier League is wired differently. It is powered by friction: it consumes it, sets it on fire, puts it on television and shouts about the consequences. Indeed, perhaps the reason that other recent English World Cup adventures left such a strange taste in the mouth, is that they were just too damn premierleaguesque for their own good.

If there’s a point to the Premier League, then it’s to make money out of a country having an argument with itself. No wonder Gareth Southgate got relegated. That’s just not his thing at all.

Still, Sky’s optimism wasn’t entirely misplaced. Leicester gave away a silly penalty, and Paul Pogba played really well. Clearly the World Cup is still hanging around, at least for the moment. Give it a couple of weeks.

Too early? Pah. It’s never too early to start getting to grips with the serious intellectual business that is tactical evolution. For what greater thrill has football to offer than the chance to be the first person to notice that Manchester City have, between minutes 30 and 60, begun to target one half-space more than the other? None. The answer is none.

Anyway, here’s the really big tactical development from the Premier League so far, a development that threatens to disrupt one of the most hallowed principles of the sport. You may want to sit down, and move any breakable objects out of reach. Because they’ve only gone and done it, the fools.

Weird penalty run ups are good now.

It’s okay. It’s okay. Take a moment.

As everyone knows, the stranger the penalty run-up, the greater the chance of a miss. There is a platonic ideal — a few steps, a bit of an angle — and any variation too great will invite disaster. Too long, too short, too straight, too sideways, too elaborate, too fussy, too quick, too slow … all asking for the same kind of trouble. Don’t go full Zaza. Don’t even go part Zaza.

Or so we thought. But after this weekend, when Paul Pogba went full Elmer Fudd, and Jorginho skipped and then strolled up to his, perhaps it’s time to reconsider. Not least because Pogba was making an important statement in a wider war. After all, nobody hates faffing around before penalties more than the Extremely Serious Football Man, who also hates dabbing, dancing, smiling, haircuts, over-ambitious passing and, ultimately, Pogba himself.

Now, let’s all take a moment to wonder how Jose Mourinho feels when his players mess around on the approach to a penalty kick.

Anyway, British football is a memetic business, and when the big clubs act and succeed, the rest of the world follows. We can look forward, then to players at all levels bringing out the tippy-toes, the stutters, the hops and the skips. The future is coming. And … coming. And, er, jumping up and down on the spot a bit? It’s turned round! And— oh, it’s here. Goal!

Right, it’s half-remembered cultural reference time. It’s a monologue. Probably. From a film. We think. And the man delivering the monologue — pretty sure it’s a man — is a policeman. Though that might just be a question of playing the odds, since it’s amazing how many policemen you end up seeing in films. Or maybe on the television.

Anyway, this maybe-police-probably-man is old, as maybe-police-probably-men go, and is unhappy. He’s complaining that he’s been pottering along quite happily, doing his job (whatever it is) the way he’s always done it, and now all of a sudden he’s being told that he’s been doing his job wrong. Badly. Or at least incorrectly. He might be complaining about computers, or paperwork; he might be complaining about political correctness going mad.

Either way, he’s definitely feeling dislocated. The world has changed around him, sneakily and without warning, and now he’s expected to do things he doesn’t even really understand. You might not sympathise, not as such. It’s not like all the traditional ways of being a cop [citation needed] were particularly admirable. But you’re definitely supposed to empathise. The world could eat you, too.

Anyway, this monologue but with Petr Cech, on being asked to pass the ball around a bit more, just after he nearly passed the ball into his own net.

Liverpool have peaked. Sure, they could win every trophy in the world this season, and score a million goals, and drive every Manchester United fan into the very depths of despair. But none of that’s going to beat Mark Noble and Jack Wilshere, both cracked square in the bollocks inside of a minute. There’s just nowhere to go from there.

… has always been at his most delightfully Rooneyish when he is permitted, by circumstance, to show off. To be the really good kid in the school playground.

When he is set free from the concerns of football as a complicated sport, and released into the simple game itself. There he acts not quite on instinct, which is thoughtless, but with an extreme sensitivity, that manifests on the pitch as a kind of footballing innocence. He acts, and then he acts again, and the right things happen.

Like this. Run very fast! Tackle very hard! Forward, and … ping. A series of perfect actions: the cleanest, most appropriate solution. Kudos also to Luciano Acosta, who makes a lovely foul on the edge of the box just as Orlando begin to break. The assist to the assist. Prizes for them both.