FABIO CAPELLO will tell you that a national team coach's job has two parts to it: identifying the right players to call up and then getting them to perform, both in terms of developing a footballing identity as well as on matchday. Over the last few weeks, he's been busy with the former; as of tomorrow he'll get stuck into the latter.

His last port of call before the start of the Premier League season was Hafnarfjordur, a few miles outside Reykjavik. The England boss and his assistant Franco Baldini split their observer duties between Aston Villa, who won 4-1 in Iceland, and Manchester City, home to Denmark's Midtjylland. Evidently Capello got the short end of the stick.

Then again, England take on the Czechs this Wednesday in what will be the final tune-up before the World Cup qualifying campaign begins in September. And, right now, the field remains wide open.

Which is why, up at the Kapiakriki Stadium, Capello was as focused on the likes of Craig Gardner, Marlon Harewood, Nigel Reo-Coker and Nicky Shorey as he was on Ashley Young, Gabriel Agbonlahor, Curtis Davies and Gareth Barry. And, in Manchester, Baldini kept tabs not just on Joe Hart and Micah Richards, but Michael Johnson and Daniel Sturridge as well.

Yes, that's how wide open it is. Privately, the England coaching staff have sent the message that nobody with an English passport is beyond consideration.

One source described Capello's England as a series of concentric circles. Those who, barring injury, will definitely start, those who will definitely be in the squad and those who have a shot.

The first group is surprisingly small: Wayne Rooney, Steven Gerrard, Rio Ferdinand. That's it. Those three are considered a class apart by Capello. Not only is their place secure, the team is likely to be built around them, ensuring that they are best placed to - as Capello puts it - "make a difference".

The second group are fighting for their places, but at least they know that if the World Cup were tomorrow (and England qualified) they'd be on their way to South Africa. We're talking about David James, Wes Brown, John Terry, Ashley Cole, Gareth Barry, David Bentley, Owen Hargreaves, Frank Lampard and Joe Cole. Only injury or a severe drop in performance will prevent them from being part of the 2010 World Cup.

Add the two groups together and you have a total of 12 players, which means there are a full 11 spots still open. It's no wonder then that Capello - while bemoaning the lack of England-eligible players in the Premier League - is casting his net as widely as possible.

For Capello, that means getting to know as many players as possible. And, without a network of scouts and contacts he fully trusts (Baldini aside), he's doing it the old-fashioned way: watching lots of games in the flesh and trying to call-up as many viable England candidates as possible.

"Think about it, as a manager he's never worked with any current England players apart from Beckham," says one source. "He's watched a lot of games on television, but you don't really learn anything from TV. The way he judges and evaluates guys has to necessarily be watching them in person and, especially, seeing them on the training pitch where he can determine if and how they fit what he's trying to do."

Baldini's role - initially questioned by a portion of the English press - is crucial in this context. As a former agent and general manager of Roma he built a reputation as a sterling talent-spotter, one whose skills complement Capello's. Baldini's "eye" for a player is legendary in Italy.

Baldini believes that beyond a player's physical and mental traits - technique, athleticism, confidence, tactical sense - there are a number of intangibles which can best be judged by observing how his team-mates react to him.

The idea is that nobody knows a player better than his own team-mates. And the way team-mates react to a player in a competitive match is bound to be entirely honest and genuine. Do they seek him out when the going gets tough? What kind of runs do they make when he receives the ball? How much trust do they place in him?

Capello views Baldini's skill set as invaluable, because he brings to the table an ability to assess from afar which the England manager hasn't necessarily fully developed during his 20-year career in coaching.

As a club manager, he had an array of scouts selecting and bringing in players, most of whom were only evaluated once they were on board. Thus, Capello's strength is assessing players on the training pitch.

Of course, this only takes you so far. Once you have the players, you have to turn them into a side that can perform and get results. Here, again, Capello finds himself in virgin territory. He's used to working with players week in, week out for 46 weeks a year. In such a context, you have the time to introduce changes in terms of tactics and playing style that can overhaul a team.

This is what he did at AC Milan when he abandoned the long-held 4-4-2 and reinvented Marcel Desailly as a deep-lying defensive midfielder.

Or in his first spell at Real Madrid, when he turned Raul into a left-sided midfielder and conjured up a system of positional shifts to accommodate him. Or, indeed, at Roma, where his putative 3-4-1-2 actually featured Cafu as a de facto winger.

Capello's admirers suggest that the above are examples of his profound tactical nous. His detractors say - perhaps unfairly - that with the world-class players at his disposal any old system would have worked. Either way, it takes time for a team to absorb such tactical innovations and its hard to see England offering up anything revolutionary in that department, not when Capello only gets to see his players for a few days every six weeks.

So don't expect any profound tactical changes on Wednesday. The plan, at least for the early part of qualifying, is to get the necessary results and develop a deeper understanding of the raw material at his disposal.

And, despite protestations to the contrary, there is a lot of raw material to sift through before he finds his 23 for South Africa.