Following England's 3-1 victory over Egypt at Wembley, the papers are filled with post-match analysis. Deposed captain John Terry, as predicted, picked up a few boos early on in the game but started to win the fans over as the match went on and, for Martin Samuel in the Daily Mail, nobody does it better, even if he is a rotter.

In the end, pragmatism won. A few boos to begin with, gradually dwindling as the minutes ticked by and Wembley realised what lies beneath. Celebration at the end, and the worst forgotten.

England cannot afford to be without John Terry in South Africa, nor the absent bogeyman Ashley Cole. The reality is that for all the fine sermons, even those from Fabio Capello, English football needs its rotters. Terry is the last central defender of international pedigree left standing, while Cole is so far ahead of those who would lay claim to his place that it is like watching a different grade of the sport.

Egypt are a decent team, despite their failure to reach the World Cup finals, and they proved difficult last night. A full-strength England side might not have struggled, but this was far from Capello’s ideal selection, particularly at the back.

Terry was the only first-choice defender available, and it showed. Cole was hugely missed on the left and Wayne Bridge would have been no great improvement. Those who came to bury Terry for depriving the team of Cole’s understudy quickly decided to keep their counsel as the truth became apparent.

Contempt turned to, if not appreciation, then grudging respect for the former captain. There was even an attempt at a trumpet serenade, although there were few takers.

Chris Rock, the comedian, says that a man’s capacity for infidelity is directly related to his ability and opportunity to cheat. It is a little like that with football. The desire for a moral stand is largely related to how it will affect the starting XI.

So, if Capello’s England squad were full of cracking central defenders, if Rio Ferdinand and Ledley King were fit, available and in outstanding form, if Jamie Carragher had not retired, if Jonathan Woodgate was not an accident waiting to happen, if Matthew Upson had not been the bloke who fell over and allowed Mohamed Zidan, of Egypt, to score the first goal of the game, then the appetite for retribution against Terry would perhaps have been longer lasting.

As it was, by the time Upson got a worm’s-eye view of Zidan’s departing backside, the facts of life for England in World Cup year were so frighteningly obvious that Terry could have been spotted making the ‘call me’ hand signal to the players’ wives section of the main stand, and as long as he got back to cover his man in time, the crowd would have agreed to turn a blind eye.

Theo Walcott, meanwhile, threatened to silence a few doubters early on as he burst through to supply Frank Lampard with a gilt-edged chance, but he struggled as the game went on before being replaced in the second half. Richard Williams in the Guardian says Walcott represents England's clipped wing in the absence of the injured Aaron Lennon.

England should have struck the first blow as early as the fifth minute tonight, when Theo Walcott ran on to Wayne Rooney's through-pass and guided the ball carefully across the penalty area into the path of Frank Lampard. From a position in which he is normally guaranteed to score, the Chelsea midfielder hit a shot that deflected off the Egypt goalkeeper, Essam El-Hadary, and went behind for a corner.

Walcott's part in the move was the sort of incisive contribution that Arsenal's supporters have seen too rarely this season since the return of the young forward from the latest operation to cure his congenital shoulder problems. Sparingly used by Arsène Wenger, he has made only seven starts this season, three of them since the turn of the year, with just one goal, against Blackburn back in October, to show for his efforts.

Wenger has taken a careful, almost cautious approach to the evolution of a player who was taken to the last World Cup as a 17-year-old without having played a minute of Premier League football. Although Walcott came to notice with Southampton as a second striker, the Arsenal manager has preferred to put him out on the right wing while he acclimatises to the pace and intensity of the top flight.

More wholehearted in his employment of Walcott, Fabio Capello has followed Wenger's example in positional terms.

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Whether Capello would have shown such consistent faith had Aaron Lennon always been available must be open to question. Three years older and considerably more experienced in terms of domestic football, the Tottenham winger is far less gauche than Walcott, particularly in his selection and application of the final ball, although he lacks his north London rival's directness and burning pace.

One of the problems of playing Walcott on the wing is that, unlike Lennon or any specialist in the role, he has no tricks – and, bizarrely, in three years under Wenger, playing almost invariably on the flank, he does not seem to have picked up any. On several occasions, facing his marker with the ball at his feet and space waiting to be exploited behind the defence, he was comfortably dispossessed at the first time of asking by Said Moawad or Hossam Ghaly.

His failings would have been more obvious in the context of a better collective performance. Fortunately for him others were doing even worse. Wayne Rooney, spoken of during the week as one of the two or three best players in the world, produced what may have been his worst 45 minutes of football since turning professional, giving the ball away with what should have been straightforward passes on several occasions, while his strike partner, Jermain Defoe, gave a tepid showing that led to his withdrawal at the interval.

Rooney and Gerrard injected far more urgency into England's approach work at the start of the second half but it was a pass from Gareth Barry – hitherto almost invisible – that gave Peter Crouch the chance to register his 19th senior international goal and to spare England's blushes with the equaliser.

Seconds later Walcott was leaving the field, to be replaced by Wright-Phillips, having been unable to provide a shred of evidence to change the minds of those who believe that the golden display of September 10, 2008 was a bit of a fluke and that he has not trained on.