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BBC pundit Danny Murphy has claimed that Kalvin Phillips’ defensive role at Leeds United is “a bit of a waste” after his impressive performances at Euro 2020.
Since Marcelo Bielsa took over at Leeds, Phillips’ game has improved tenfold. He was one of their best performers during their promotion season in 2019/20 as well as their return Premier League campaign in 2020/21.
His form led to his inclusion in Gareth Southgate’s England squad for Euro 2020. He shone for the Three Lions this summer as he started in all seven of their tournament games.
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For Leeds, Phillips plays deep in a defensive role. But for England this summer, the midfielder has been more advanced. This enabled him to brilliantly set up Raheem Sterling’s winning goal in their opener against Croatia.
Murphy has told talkSPORT that he prefers Phillips playing further forward:
“Temperament, fitness and quality and I actually think, although Leeds play him in that holding role. But I actually like him a bit further ahead with the insurance of someone behind him,” Murphy said.
“He is technically good enough to go on and make goals and score goals, I think, as he progresses in his career. I think he could be a bit of a waste just having him in a holding role.”
Last week, John Barnes suggested that Phillips and Declan Rice were England’s “two most important players” at Euro 2020:
“Harry Kane has now come and scored the goals, in terms of getting us where we are, he carried that biggest threat.
“But I’ve said all along, the two most important players for England in this tournament have been Declan Rice and Kalvin Phillips.
“You talk about those two, and people talking about not playing two holding midfielders, ‘do we need that?’.
“But they’ve protected the back four, we’ve only conceded one goal, and as much as you look at the defence, the work they have done in protecting them and giving England the balance of having four attacking players; Mason Mount, Harry Kane, Sterling and [Phil] Foden, [Jack] Grealish or [Bukayo] Saka.
‘Those two give them that base and that balance that I don’t think we’ve ever had.”
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