It is all about trust.
We could talk until we were blue in the face about the best formation. We could debate the merits of Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard.
We could eulogize about the phenomenal desire and goalscoring talents of Wayne Rooney and lament the current injury problems among the strikers.
But in the end the most vital commodity of any successful football team is confidence among the players and confidence in the manager.
If England were an insurance company then under Fabio Capello their trust rating would have risen to triple A.
So much so that a win against Ukraine at Wembley tomorrow and England could just about book their flights and accommodation for the World Cup in South Africa in 2010. After the minimum of fuss and the maximum of efficiency.
It is a measure of Capello's stabilizing influence that even the injury mayhem which has deprived him of strikers Emile Heskey, Carlton Cole and Darren Bent, has not dented the optimism.
Not that England fans should get carried away.
Capello so far has done only what any manager worth £6million a year should be expected to achieve with a group of outstanding players.
He has restored discipline in dress codes and punctuality and all those little things which might seem peripheral but matter in terms of nurturing togetherness.
He has coaxed Gerrard and Lampard to play well in the same side, something which proved beyond the ken of Sven-Goran Eriksson and Steve McClaren.
He has brought an uncompromising manner and a clarity of thought to England's football.
And he has pinned his reputation on a system which involves three midfielders and a big target man, around whom Rooney and Gerrard have freedom to move when England are in possession.
It worked well in the 4-0 victory against an abject Slovakia at the weekend.
With Heskey's injury, however, the temptation against Ukraine must have been to push Rooney up front and allow Gerrard to play in the central role he does alongside Fernando Torres for Liverpool.
Yet Capello has confirmed Peter Crouch, the tallest target man of them all and not his favorite striker, will start. By doing so he confirmed he believes in his system. Confirmed, too, that he does not believe Rooney is at his best as a lone striker.
The truth is that against Ukraine, the intricacies of the striking formation should not overly matter.
At Wembley England should have more than enough. Which is not to say there are not still concerns about Capello's regime.
One is his hard line on Michael Owen, who admittedly has struggled for fitness and does not fit into Capello's preferred way of playing, but whose 40 goals in 89 appearances must surely qualify him for a role as an impact substitute at least. Especially amid one of the worst striking crises in recent times.
Another is the fragility in central defense where Rio Ferdinand, John Terry, Jonathan Woodgate, the list is endless, all seem prone to injury problems.
The main one, which will remain unanswered for some time yet, is whether Capello's system and confidence can measure up against the world's best, especially considering the runaround they were given by European champions Spain last month.
They are the kind of worries which derail teams, especially ones with a lack of quality in depth, in mid-tournament.
Yet, if all things go to plan against Ukraine, the chances are Capello will have eight months to work on that after the final qualifying game against Belarus in October.
The momentum is with England. It is a precious sporting commodity they must not let slip.
