With a quick shuffle of his feet and a burst of instant acceleration between Yohan Cabayé and Alou Diarra that left both Frenchmen looking as though they had been fleeced by a particularly adroit pickpocket, Alex Oxlade‑Chamberlain showed us what he is made of on Monday night. Roy Hodgson, however, was probably more interested in how the teenager came out of the evening in terms of maintaining his role in the team's shape while limiting France's attacking opportunities down the left flank of England's defence. If the answer to the first question was "quite well", the second was not so satisfactory.

Neither Oxlade-Chamberlain nor Ashley Cole could do very much to contain the irrepressible Mathieu Debuchy, the Lille wing-back who came into the side as a replacement for the injured Bacary Sagna and appears to have made himself indispensable. Debuchy tore England apart in the first half, racing free to put over four or five dangerous crosses, although as the game went on he found team-mates willing to take over the task of testing other possible weaknesses in Hodgson's defensive scheme.

A couple of months older than Wayne Rooney was when he became the youngest player to represent England in the European Championship finals in 2004, Oxlade-Chamberlain never looked overawed, but his lack of experience comes into play when the ball is at his feet and there is the opportunity to make things happen. At the moment he rushes his pass, or lacks the coolness to see a move ahead.

It was nevertheless good to see Hodgson willing to take a gamble by picking an 18‑year‑old after only one appearance as a substitute against Norway and one start against Belgium, both in the run-up to the tournament. The manager must have seen things in training that impressed him sufficiently to warrant the risk of exposing the young Arsenal player against opponents of such guaranteed quality.

Temperament and technique are probably the two key factors that brought him into the side ahead of Theo Walcott, himself a former teenage prodigy who is now 23 and has won 25 England caps. Oxlade-Chamberlain has a solidity to him, and an air of concentration, that Walcott will never be able to summon, although the younger man is still a long way from showing that ability to shred the best defences as his Arsenal colleague does on his best days.

The piece of opportunism that embarrassed France's two defensive midfielders in the 18th minute gave a glimpse of his future. As early as the third minute, Oxlade-Chamberlain robbed Adel Rami and cut in with powerful intent, but could not manage to slide his pass through the French cover to find Danny Welbeck.

In defensive mode he mirrored the actions of James Milner on the right flank, always tucking in when the ball was on the other side of the pitch, keeping close to Steven Gerrard and Scott Parker. There was a single indiscretion when, 10 minutes before the interval, he produced a clumsy foul to stop Debuchy, giving away the free‑kick from which Diarra forced Joe Hart to parry a fierce header.

There was never a question of him or any other member of England's midfield quartet searching for opportunities to get ahead of their forwards, Welbeck and Ashley Young. On the sole occasion in the second half when Oxlade-Chamberlain seemed as though he might be about to try, Diarra was quick to snuff out the danger. The strategy was so restrictive that the England forwards sometimes looked reluctant even to get ahead of themselves.

As half-expected, the contrast between the two approaches closely resembled the matches between Chelsea and Barcelona in April. Where France were advancing in numbers, the man in possession always able to count on close support from several blue shirts around the opposition's penalty area, England left their attackers to fend for themselves. Welbeck foraged with intelligence and evident hunger, while Young never got the sort of break that allowed him to make one goal and score another in Hodgson's warm-up matches.

If England were going to get a goal, the likeliest source always seemed to be a set-piece.

So the emphasis on Monday night was very definitely on the solidity of Hodgson's defence in the central areas, and it is rather difficult to see it being shifted before the team go home. The manager's methods have brought two wins and a draw in three matches, with only one goal conceded, and he would be justified in feeling some satisfaction, given the brief time he has been permitted to get them doing things his way.

Hodgson knows what he wants, and it is refreshing to see that a man of generally conservative instincts is capable of looking beyond known quantities. At this stage Oxlade-Chamberlain is all potential and it would have been easier to give the shirt to a player with more miles under his belt. But the manager is clearly willing to back the promise of something extra.

"Wayne Rooney showed all those years ago that if you're good enough you're old enough," Steven Gerrard said afterwards. "Oxlade-Chamberlain showed tonight that he's good enough for this level. He's still got a lot of learning to do. But playing with experienced players, he'll get there." Against Sweden on Friday, there may be scope for a little more self-expression to go with the already impressive discipline.