Why this will be Theo Walcott's night - and possibly his season too

By Robbie Savage

Published 08:14 03/09/10

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This could be Theo Walcott’s night. In fact, this could be Theo Walcott’s season.

And I would love to see him triumph for England and Arsenal after his summer dumping by Fabio Capello and the recent public debate about his “football brain”.

I loved Alan Hansen as a player and I still love him as a pundit. Same with Chris Waddle.

But I do think that to say someone doesn’t have a “football brain” is incredibly harsh.

I know what they are getting at. Maybe for Theo, the first two yards aren’t yet in his head. Maybe he doesn’t have the pure instinct of a Cantona or a Scholes. Maybe he’s not quite as special as a Dalglish or a Gascoigne, greats who Alan and Chris played alongside week-in, week-out.

But those players are very, very few and far between – I certainly was never one – and we must not overlook the fact that Theo has so much going for him.

As a late developer who only started playing football seriously when he was 12, he’s still learning and he does not have a bad tutor in Arsene Wenger – a man, incidentally, who has been ruthless in the past about dumping British youngsters if he doesn’t think they will make the grade.

While Walcott continues his studies, his electric pace will get him by. I was one of very few pundits who said that alone should have got him to South Africa and I feel I was vindicated by England’s lack of speed at the World Cup.

Walcott is also a hard worker who has clearly improved his poise on the ball and his finishing this summer. At only 21, he’s already England’s best option in his position. Who’s to say he cannot improve still further?

Yes, he might not be a footballing genius in the way Wayne Rooney was at his age. Yet Kevin Keegan wasn’t either.

He was still playing for Scunthorpe at 20, but he went on to win the European Cup and be named European Footballer Of The Year twice. Walcott is full of potential and we will see if he has some of Keegan’s incredible desire.

But what he already has is good enough for an England team in transition and after being starved of service in South Africa, I think Rooney will be delighted to see his name on the team-sheet against Bulgaria tonight.

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International football on a Friday night. Feels a bit weird, doesn’t it?

Yet as a Mirror survey shows, 95 out of 100 people would say their club side is more important than their country.

They won’t be complaining next Saturday, when they see how much fitter their team’s returning ­internationals are with an extra day of training under their belts.

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