Standing in a doorway deep in the Donbass Arena here on Monday night, Steven Gerrard was taken back briefly to a time when there was rather less harmony in the England camp.

It was two years to the day since that goalless draw against Algeria in Cape Town, a game  memorable not so much for the dire football as the diatribe Wayne Rooney directed at the
England fans down the lens of a television camera.

Then under the guidance of Fabio Capello, England were in a mess. The match was  followed by a few beers, which John Terry later presented as some kind of players’ mutiny during a press conference that actually sounded like a one-man coup.

In it together: England's squad looked at ease ahead of their crunch game against Ukraine

Two years on and the mood could not be more different. ‘The reason for that is because of how we are playing,’ said Gerrard. ‘We are  playing well and we are playing  positively. We are enjoying how we are playing. Everyone knows that in South Africa the team weren’t  playing at a good level. Now we can’t wait for tomorrow night. We have Wayne Rooney back and  everything is positive.’

After two excellent performances against France and Sweden there is a sense of unity and a growing  feeling of confidence, even if both Gerrard and Roy Hodgson were at pains to temper their ambitions and look no further than Tuesday evening’s game against Ukraine.

Hodgson knows the low expectation that travelled with England is quietly being ushered out of the back door. Rooney has spoken of how England are among the sides capable of winning the tournament. Gerrard responded to their spirited defeat of Sweden by declaring this England side ‘unbreakable’.

England’s manager summed it up nicely. ‘You play football at international level to try to get people  carried away,’ he said. ‘Dreaming is what this is all about.’

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