It was difficult, listening to Joe Hart’s version of events, not to suspect he was putting on a front at a time when there has to be a legitimate debate about whether someone in his position – no future at Manchester City, no idea where he might end up next and, perhaps understandably, little of the old assuredness – still warrants his place in the England team.

Hart had just been through the videos of the two free-kicks Leigh Griffiths had put either side of him during that wild finish to England’s 2-2 draw in Scotland and there was no indication that a goalkeeper with 71 caps, nine years at this level and more clean sheets than anyone in that position other than Peter Shilton and David Seaman, considered himself to be at fault.

“As a goalkeeper, you set your wall up, and sometimes there’s nothing you can do,” was Hart’s take. “He’s produced two bits of quality. They weren’t sidefoots, they weren’t curlers, they were what I call ‘heavy’ – my boring goalkeeping technical term. He put them over the wall, then they picked up pace and sometimes you have to say well done.

“I went over to him at the end to say well done because that’s my personality, hate it or love it. I wanted to congratulate him and talk about it because I was interested about his thought process, too. To do it twice in a few minutes, after not really having a sniff the whole game, was a big moment for him. He took one with a minute to go in the game at Wembley and used a different technique. It’s a free shot from 25 yards and unfortunately his training has paid off.

“I asked my wall to jump but not excessively because people are clever now and they go underneath, but I’ve seen it again and we would have needed four or five Peter Crouches in that wall to make a difference. What else can you say? Sometimes you just have to say well done.”

And he was right, to some extent, bearing in mind the lopsided amount of attention that has been paid to Hart’s goalkeeping rather than the elegance of those strikes – first to his left, then his right – from the Scotland striker.

Unfortunately for Hart, these are not the first moments that have left the clear impression he is not the goalkeeper of old and the truth is neither free-kick was aimed fully into the corner of his net. From that distance, an elite goalkeeper would not normally be beaten twice and nobody could really take issue with Gareth Southgate if England’s manager is concerned about the way Hart’s career, at the age of 30, appears to be drifting.

As it turns out, Southgate will remove him from the team to play France in Paris on Tuesday, a decision that Hart did not seem to have been notified about as he talked about devoting time to studying the free-kick techniques of Dimitri Payet and Paul Pogba. That, however, is not Hart being dropped, even if Southgate is aware it might be perceived that way.

“Our intention was always to give someone else a game,” Southgate said. “However it looks, I will have to ride that out. I am seeing a headline that says ‘Hart is not safe’‚ but the fact is we need competition in every position. Who knows who will be fit and available [in the World Cup]? Too many times we have got to a tournament when a key player is not fully fit. We cannot rely on one or two players.”

All of which makes perfect sense now Jack Butland has recovered from his broken ankle, with Tom Heaton and Fraser Forster also in better form than England’s established No1, and not forgetting the credentials of Jordan Pickford, currently preparing for the Under-21 European Championship.

Southgate’s tone was supportive, on the whole, but Hart is in a state of limbo, back at Manchester City after a patchy loan arrangement with Torino but acutely aware he has no future under Pep Guardiola, the manager who fast-tracked him out of the club. In the circumstances, with zero offers from other teams, it is probably no surprise that Hart has never fully regained his best form since the ordeal of Euro 2016.

“I am sure he will be playing at a high level,” Southgate said. “He has had an important experience abroad. His contribution [for England] has been high and without his save against Slovenia we would be worse off in the qualifying group. For me, the goals were two moments of high quality, but we will look at them.”

Southgate’s hope is that Hart’s club situation will be resolved by the time England resume their World Cup qualifying programme against Malta and Slovakia, Group F’s second-placed side, at the start of September.

In the meantime, the former England captain Terry Butcher was among those calling for Southgate to change his goalkeeper and there was at least an acknowledgement from Hart that he was vulnerable. “This shirt’s not mine,” he said. “It’s not nailed-on mine, it’s no one’s. We’ve got high-quality goalkeepers and I will have to be playing at a good, well, at the top level, to the maximum of my ability, even to get in the squad.

“I am not a robot. Sometimes I do have thoughts about it [the uncertainty]. But there is nothing to get down about. It’s another exciting adventure, another move, the next step in my career, the next challenge for me personally. I love personal challenges. I have never shied away from one and I don’t intend to now.”