Gareth Southgate praised Rico Lewis’s England debut in the 1-1 draw with North Macedonia and insisted there was no blame attached to him after a harsh penalty was awarded by VAR.
Lewis, starting his first England game the day before he turns 19, did not panic after he was penalised for inadvertently catching Bojan Miovski in the face with his left hand when jumping for a header in the penalty area. A lengthy VAR review awarded the penalty at the end of the first half with Enis Bardhi scoring the rebound following Jordan Pickford’s save.
The England manager hailed Lewis for bouncing back from the set-back. “He should be very proud because we were very, very pleased with what he did,” Southgate said of the Manchester City player. “His composure with the ball was outstanding.
“The penalty shouldn’t [overshadow his debut] because he was excellent. His performance and his reaction to what I know will have been a disappointment for him, but we’re not looking at him for being at fault.
“At half-time, we just pointed out how well he was playing and how well the team were playing and that we had to keep probing in the right way.
“We thought throughout the game Rico was excellent; great composure, great resilience. We didn’t feel he had anything to come back from. I know sometimes as a player you might feel that, but there was no crime. We were pleased with everything he did.”
England were fortunate not to concede an early penalty, however, when Harry Maguire clattered into Eljis Elmas and brought down the North Macedonia striker. Southgate admitted that “might have been” a penalty but said he believed the one that was given was not. “I have zero to say about it, which probably tells you everything,” he said.
'Now we look forward to draw'
England salvaged a draw with Jani Atanasov scoring an own goal after Harry Kane had come on and immediately but the defender under pressure at a corner. It means Southgate’s team finish Euro 2024 qualifying, and the calendar year, unbeaten and the manager said he was pleased with the run.
“I have to be pleased with the progress of the team,” he said. “If you’d said at the start of the campaign that we would be eight wins, two draws at the end of the year, it’s a pretty good record given the fixtures that we’ve had,” he said. “We can now start to look forward.”
England will be one of the top seeds for the tournament draw which takes place on December 2. “The next exciting bit is the draw and we will see what the path looks like,” Southgate added. “There are a lot of players to keep a track on.”
