It's time to stand and deliver, Fabio

Slaven Bilic, the Croatian boss, just damns us with the faintest praise before pronouncing his men's superiority in every department.

It's when you hear this that you're reminded how far England's stock has tumbled, not just at home but overseas.

Capello says he likes challenges; his first one here tonight, then, is to ensure that England's lurch towards a laughing stock is halted right now.

He doesn't have to win, but simply has to demonstrate, with a team performance-studded with discipline and organisation, that his players really are responding to his leadership.

Bilic noted how Croatia's rise under his stewardship didn' t happen overnight but had taken two years of slog.

He doubts whether Capello has yet had the time or new personnel to offer a different threat to that dismissed by Luka Modric and Co two years ago.

What concerns him more, you suspect, is Capello himself.

"He is the top, but it does not mean that we do not sleep due to him. Capello is not the one who is playing," Bilic sniffed.

But how could he write off Capello's England when he still recalled how the man had once inspired a Milan side, rated as no hopers in the 1994 European Cup Final, to a 4-0 win against star-studded Barcelona?

"He's achieved top things and knows sooner or later it will happen again. The way he goes about analysing the game makes us focused and calm," said Terry.

"I think he's a manager who can make a difference." Like starting tonight by getting the first big decisions right.

If nothing else, Bilic at least knows there'll be no heaven-sent Steve McClaren-like gifts with a 3-5-2 wrapping from Capello - but beyond that, he's reduced to educated guesswork to gauge how England's starting XI will look.

Terry had hinted it might be 4-4-2 but the best bet, after the 4- 3- 2- 1 formation used in practice last night, is that Theo Walcott and Joe Cole will support Wayne Rooney up front while David Beckham, Frank Lampard and Gareth Barry constitute the three-man midfield.

Such a line-up would allow Capello, with uncharacteristic ambition, to field three potential attacking match winners while also enabling the accommodation of Beckham's matchless dead-ball delivery with Walcott's trickery.

Yet whoever gets the nod will receive the same message: "Go out and play with courage, not fear."

Odd how it should have come to this; the world's most revered manager and most hyped national team joining forces only to end up playing the role of little England's plucky underdogs up against the might of a small country which didn't even have a team two decades ago.

So, it's Fabio's time, time for him to remind us all why the FA went out to buy their six million pound man. Judgement starts here.