Welbeck, Sterling and Rooney Hint at England's Rich Harvest to Come

When it comes to strikers, Arsene Wenger has a gift for a bargain.

He got Nicolas Anelka for £500,000 and sold for £22 million. Emmanuel Adebayor cost £3 million, Robin van Persie a bit less—and they produced nearly £25 million each for Arsenal. To the list of snips it seems we may soon be adding Danny Welbeck, even though Wenger had to give Manchester United £16 million as the summer window closed.

After Welbeck's display for England in Switzerland, the ranks of United fans saddened by his departure will have swollen and Arsenal followers will be counting the minutes to his debut against Manchester City at the Emirates on Saturday.

For a long time I have thought him the centre-forward Arsenal need to fill the gap left by Van Persie—though in style he's more like a cross between the Dutchman and an animated Adebayor—and it will be interesting to see how Wenger accommodates Welbeck and the popular Olivier Giroud when he returns from injury.

Two up front? That was how Roy Hodgson got the best out of Welbeck at St. Jakob-Park in Basel, pairing him with Wayne Rooney, no doubt recalling how the combination seemed to work when tried at Old Trafford a couple of years back. It was only abandoned as Sir Alex Ferguson and David Moyes preferred Van Persie, tending to use Welbeck wide because of his pace and readiness to attend to defensive duties.

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Now he's where he always wanted to be for club (presumably he moved to Arsenal after positional assurances) and country.

Two goals against the Swiss more than vindicated Hodgson's decision to make the switch from his former club position. The strange consequence is that Daniel Sturridge, hitherto regarded as one of England's main assets, a silver lining of the World Cup cloud, may find it difficult to get back into the attack when fit again.

How can Hodgson disturb Welbeck and Rooney, who were incorporated into a terrific trio with Raheem Sterling, the teenager linking with them from his new position at the top of a diamond?

Switzerland were assiduous in their marking of Sterling, who has suddenly taken over from Rooney as England's main threat, but what they found, as others may discover on the road to the European Championship finals in France, is that you can keep one quiet but not all three.

Welbeck's crucial first goal demonstrated that. It was brilliantly made by Sterling from a pass by Rooney and, being so reminiscent of a similar goal made by Rooney for Sturridge against Italy in Brazil, may have helped to convince some of Hodgson's doubters that the manager does both understand quality and have the ability to coax it out of the latest wave of aspirants to end years—decades, the best part of half a century—of under-achievement.

I've always been a Hodgson fan and reckoned he was ideally qualified for the England job after guiding Switzerland to the World Cup and European Championship in the mid-1990s. The Football Association knew better, though, and lashed out vast salaries on designer managers who had built big reputations in the Italian club game—first Sven-Goran Eriksson and then Fabio Capello.

Wiser counsels eventually prevailed when Hodgson was appointed in 2012, but after the World Cup he became an object of scepticism, and the build-up to the trip to Switzerland, especially after a dull display in a 1-0 friendly win over Norway, was tense. Hodgson doesn't suffer fools gladly, or simplistic questions, and when someone pointed out that England had contrived only two shots on target against the Norwegians, his retort—"f-----g bollocks"—was seized upon as evidence of a flawed temperament.

Now he can swear like the proverbial trooper in the prelude to the October qualifiers against San Marino and Estonia, and it will probably be hailed as the straight talking of an admirably passionate man.

The critics have been routed and, given the relative ease of England's path to France, may not have much opportunity to regroup before the finals in the summer of 2016. On the night Hodgson needed his men to perform, they did, from Joe Hart in goal to Welbeck at the front, with the contrasting pair of Jack Wilshere and Jordan Henderson offering much promise in between.

And there is time to address an apparent shortage of top-class defensive talent.

Time, given the youth of this team, is very much on England's side now. And Hodgson has made it so. He deserves the rich harvest at which Welbeck and company hinted at St. Jakob-Park.

Patrick Barclay is an award-winning football journalist and best-selling author, whose portfolio includes biographies on Jose Mourinho, Sir Alex Ferguson and Herbert Chapman.

Follow @paddybarclay