Playing out from the back is a game of risk and reward. The reward is that you keep the ball. The risk? You’ll lose to the Netherlands and it’ll be all your own fault.

England’s loss in the UEFA Nations League semi-final, in which the Netherlands scored twice from England mistakes in extra time after finishing a goal apiece in 90 minutes - was a catastrophic demonstration of what happens when playing out from the back goes wrong.

It’s a strategy that’s easy to lambast when its fundamental and very obvious flaw comes to pass.

It is risky. But the reason ball-playing goalkeepers have play with supreme confidence on their side is that a couple of mistakes are accepted as an inevitability over the course of a season, such is the richness of the reward.

Still, sometimes even the best have to just boot it.

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The suggestion that England scrap the tactical basis of the world’s best teams is simplistic nonsense and should be dismissed out of hand.

What lost this match was the lack of the midfield passing options required to do it properly and a catalogue of individual errors. Both must be fixed if England are to continue on their positive path.

Gareth Southgate omitted all of his Liverpool and Tottenham Hotspur players five days after their UEFA Champions League final, and will face some tough questions about that decision after England’s Nations League exit; Virgil van Dijk and Gini Wijnaldum both played for the Netherlands.

It’s unclear what Southgate could have done differently with those players, save for picking Trent Alexander-Arnold. Harry Kane looked sharper in flashes than he did in the Champions League final, but starting him would have been a mistake.

Dele Alli’s impact was limited and, with Harry Winks out of the squad entirely - again, questions will be asked after a decent last showing for Spurs, but his fitness is in question - the player England most missed in midfield was Jordan Henderson, who came on late to witness first hand the cock-ups of his colleagues.

A midfield three of Fabian Delph, Declan Rice and Ross Barkley wouldn’t have been anyone’s first choice but it shouldn’t have been the disaster it was.

Pundit Gary Neville has been their chief critic in the aftermath, but he also identified the Dutch plan to nullify them: squeeze the pitch and keep the pressure on the ball.

Delph isn’t the cool, reliable presence England needed. Rice, a 20-year-old winning his third cap, will have learned some harsh lessons. Barkley flattered to deceive again, right when Southgate needed a quality player to take responsibility in the middle of the park.

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Neville has skewered the midfield but they weren’t alone in disappointing. Sancho and Raheem Sterling couldn’t get into the game - when they did, England played in fits and starts. Marcus Rashford’s first half and Kane’s second, either side of their substitution, were forgettable.

But lining up in front of a solid Jordan Pickford performance was a back four that mustn’t escape criticism just because the midfield were poor. Ben Chilwell faded terribly but John Stones, Harry Maguire and Kyle Walker need to take a look at themselves.

Walker was disappointing throughout. Maguire’s decision making on the ball was dire; Stones still managed to outdo him on that front. If we’re taking risks to reap rewards we need players who aren’t going to do what Stones does far too regularly.

The defence’s mistakes were not defensive mistakes. Walker was beaten by Matthijs de Ligt for the set piece equaliser but the two extra time goals were the result of England gaffes in possession.

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The Netherlands pressed hard and deserve credit for causing problems and earning a little bit of luck. But England had the ball and the headline error in both cases was just the final act of a series of loose, panicked passes.

It wasn’t a night for taking positives but there were a few. England probably edged the first half despite struggling to get to grips with the midfield, their goal a cool Rashford penalty after he had pounced on a rather rarer Dutch mistake.

After half time England managed to open up the middle of the pitch and looked better for it, briefly, before being forced - and that might be too charitable an assessment - to defend deeper and deeper.

England defended rather well without the ball, albeit with a whiff of desperation on occasion. Blocked shots were plentiful and the Netherlands had to be patient and work for their equaliser.

But the second half and extra time belonged to them, showing us the best of a very promising Dutch side. After they’d played their way into the game they were impressive, far superior to England on the ball and more assured all over the pitch.

They deserved their win and England deserved nothing, yet it might all have been so different. England were denied a late winner in normal time when Jesse Lingard slotted past Jasper Cillessen.

VAR ruled it out for offside, one of those centimetre calls that VAR advocates praise for the accuracy afforded to officials but critics look at and wonder if that’s what the offside rule was really intended to be.

Certainly, if a television replay had showed that decision five years ago and it hadn’t been flagged, nobody would have been talking about it ten minutes later.

But VAR is a discussion for another day. England went on to be punished for the types of mental messes they’d been making all night and have to play an unwanted third-place play-off against Switzerland on Sunday.

The Nations League has been a triumph, competitive to the last, and England’s participation was thoroughly enjoyable.

But Sunday’s match really is the glorified friendly so many of us wrongly thought would blight this tournament.

Not so for the Netherlands, who head for Porto to face hosts Portugal, conquerors of the Swiss on Wednesday evening.