Noni Madueke knows what he must do for Chelsea after England cameo

Chelsea 's Cobham training ground may be the most densely-populated patch of land across the entire home counties, but head down there this week and it ought not to take much to pick out Noni Madueke .

He will be the lad with his chest puffed out, walking just that little bit taller, after an exciting England debut in midweek added to his fine start to the season.

Called up to the senior squad for the first time after his hat-trick at Wolves last month, the 22-year-old was sent on midway through the second half of Tuesday's victory over Finland and made a swift impact, laying on the second goal for centurion Harry Kane with a clever touch off the outside of his boot.

"I tried to go out there and be direct and cause problems," Madueke said. "I got an assist for Harry on his 100th appearance — it can't get much better than that. It is fun to work with Harry, because if you give him the ball in the box, he is going to get you an assist."

That last sentence was, presumably, not intended as a dig at the rather more profligate Nicolas Jackson.

Given the summer outlay of £54million on Pedro Neto, even Chelsea did not, it seems, expect Madueke to start the season quite so well, but heading to Bournemouth on Saturday, where the Blues return to Premier League action in the day's dastardly 8pm kick-off, the sense is of a player riding an early season wave.

"Noni has carried on where he left off at Chelsea," said Lee Carsley on Tuesday night, the interim England boss glowing in his praise of one of several players parachuted into the senior side from the group that won the Under-21 European Championship last summer. "He is very attacking, very sharp. Different to what we have got, a different kind of wide player."

Carsley was intelligent this week in not only freshening up a squad of beaten Euros finalists with some familiar young talent, but in handing the biggest opportunities to those considered, in modern football parlance, to be 'in a good moment', fit, sharp, playing regularly and brimming with confidence.

And yet as with them all, Madueke left with a word of warning, Carsley hinting that there will be a further shake-up to his squad for next month's international break. "Competition for places is very high and I think you will see some movement," he said. "It's important that we keep freshening it up."

Nowhere is that more true than on Madueke's right flank, where Bukayo Saka and Jarrod Bowen were rivals within this squad, and Phil Foden and Cole Palmer are due to come back in.

All four of those players are certain starters at club level and, beyond that, talismanic figures as well. It is not purely a numbers game, but when all four managed at least 30 goals and assists across competitions last season, the numbers are hard to ignore.

That is the standard, the bar set sky high. To have any chance of staying in the England mix Madueke must take his Chelsea start and run.