Tammy Abraham had the opportunity to prove himself when the head coach of the Three Lions of England, Gareth Southgate, invited him for the World Cup qualification game against Andorra.
The 24-year-old English striker has been absent from the national team for almost a year due to his inability to play regularly when he was still contracted to Chelsea.
Recall that Tammy Abraham who made his England national team debut on November 10, 2017, lost his place in the team ahead of the European Championship (Euro 2020) that took place between June and July 2021.
Coach Southgate decided not to invite Abraham for the tournament because the striker was not playing consistently for Chelsea and there were a couple of in form players available for his position in the England’s team.
His inability to play regularly at Chelsea forced the football star to leave the Premier League club for Italian Serie A side, Roma where he has been enjoying regular game time.
Since he joined the Italian club on August 17, 2021, for a transfer fee worth €40 million, Tammy Abraham has scored 4 goals and provided 3 assists in 10 games in all competitions.
This performance prompted coach Gareth Southgate to invite him for the October FIFA international break. Fortunately for Abraham, coach Southgate decided to rest his top choice forward Harry Kane and Raheem Sterling ahead of the game against Andorra.
Abraham’s chance of starting the World Cup qualification match got brighter because Dominic Calvert-Lewin was injured ahead of the game.
With those players ruled out, coach Southgate decided to start Abraham but the Roma striker waited until the 59th minute to score his first international goal in two years.
The goal made him the first English player to score for the Three Lions of England while playing for a club in Serie A. David Platt was the last player to achieve such a feat in 1995.
After the World Cup qualifier which ended 5-0 in favor of England, Tammy Abraham described the away game as a good night for him and his teammates.
He revealed how Jadon Sancho told him to get ready for his pass during halftime and the new Manchester United recruit did as he promised.
“It was a good night for me and the boys,’ said Abraham. ‘We knew it was going to be tough but we had to stay focused. Luckily we got an early goal, and we knew we’d create chances and the things we did were positive.
“Jadon told me at half-time that sometimes he’s going to cut back on his right and try to find me in the middle of the goal and that I should be ready.”
Now that Tammy Abraham has scored his international goal for England, he would wish to continue having the chance to do more for both his club and country ahead of the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar.
The step towards achieving this is to continue to cement his place at Roma by playing regularly.
“Going to Roma shows that I’m clearly doing the right things and it’s just the start hopefully”, he said. “I’m playing every week and hopefully I can keep performing.”
After scoring against Andorra on Saturday, Tammy Abraham took to his Instagram page to share pictures from the match and captioned them with: “Always an honor”.
