JORDAN Pickford will start in goal for England against Holland tomorrow night - but Gareth Southgate said the battle to be Three Lions number one remains wide open.

Southgate has handed Everton goalkeeper Pickford first chance to impress this week, giving him the start in the Amsterdam Arena.

Burnley goalkeeper Nick Pope, Jack Butland of Stoke City and West Ham loanee Joe Hart will hoping to get their chance either as a substitute against the Dutch or against Italy at Wembley on Tuesday.

"Jordan Pickford will play in goal tomorrow night," Southgate said. "He is a very agile goalkeeper, quick around his goals, he is capable of making big saves, his distribution is excellent - a really outstanding distributor of the ball with his feet which is how we want to play.

"It is a great opportunity for him. He played really well against Germany in November and it's a good chance for us to see him in another international game."

Southgate said the competition for the three goalkeeping berths in the England squad, as well as the fight to start, was a very competitive one.

The England boss also gave hope to Clarets captain Tom Heaton, who is close to a first-team return at Turf Moor but now has to dislodge Pope to get his place back at club level.

"It is a very tight call at the moment because there is four guys in the squad who have justifiable claims for different reasons," Southgate said of his goalkeepers.

"I would imagine that Tom Heaton will be sitting at home hoping he gets back into Burnley's team as well, thinking he wants to be a part of the squad too.

"We are not in a situation where we have a goalkeeper who is established in the team and playing at his club regularly and all things are aligned as you might hope at this point.

"But that is where we are, I have confidence in all of the guys that they can go in and do the job. At the moment we don't have a clear number one."

"If Jordan Pickford does well tomorrow he'll give himself a huge boost and gives us food for thought on what we're doing moving forward."