The FA content team love an anniversary. The England X feed rejoiced that it was six years since Jordan Pickford’s save in a penalty shoot-out saw off Switzerland in a Nations League finals third-place play-off.
However, listening to Thomas Tuchel, it was more the events of one year ago that came to mind. June 10 was when England flew to Germany for Euro 2024 and we know what was served up next: footballing soup. An England who lost definition and shape as Gareth Southgate seemed to just throw talents in the pot. It seems surreal now, but England began the Euros with a defence that had never started together, a midfield that had never started together and a front three used only twice before.
Sir Alex Ferguson, once asked for the biggest piece of advice he would give managers, said: “Make decisions.” It was strange — Southgate had been good at decisions previously but the range of options, particularly how to fit in all the players playing brilliantly in roles behind the striker in club football, seemed to paralyse him.
It has taken such a short time for Tuchel to face this dilemma. He may have taken the job believing that having Jude Bellingham, Cole Palmer, Phil Foden, Bukayo Saka (and others such as Jack Grealish, Marcus Rashford, Morgan Rogers and Eberechi Eze) was the opportunity of a coaching lifetime. But maybe he is already wondering whether he is a man who has been given a rich inheritance in an unspendable currency.
Because: how do you get enough of, and the right combinations of, these players in? Elements of Tuchel’s three games felt so familiar. Paper aeroplanes at Wembley, boos in Barcelona, and superstars looking sweaty and cornered as they toil to impose themselves on lowly opponents.
An England who look brilliant on the teamsheet but, to use Tuchel’s word, “stuck” on the pitch. A team only sporadically able to play with the “pace, power, strength … personalities … aggression … unique rhythm” he reveres in the English club game.
“I see us train with a smile but not play with a smile. That is your headline,” he said, reflecting on Saturday’s tortured 1-0 win over Andorra. “We need to improve in connections, in support, in interactions in the group. I feel we are too isolated on the pitch. I don’t see it has clicked between the players.”
Re-emphasising what a short time he has had — “just 11 training sessions together” — he admitted “everything has been a big learning” since taking charge. “It’s on us, it’s on me to find the right connections — like who loves to play with each other, who has a genuine connection, who takes care of each other.”
It doesn’t feel we saw much of that at Euro 2024, where Harry Kane and Bellingham bumped into each other, and Foden looked the loneliest man in football stuck out on the left, and Palmer lounged on the bench. It doesn’t feel we have seen much (apart from in flashes under Lee Carsley, when not all of the “big” players were there) of it since. Against Andorra, Tuchel tried using Palmer and Bellingham as twin No10s and chemistry was lacking.
It was Palmer’s first game under Tuchel, who will get to use Saka for the first time against Senegal at the City Ground. So, it is fair for him to talk about not having had long to assess. However, nor should he take too long to. Already it feels a clock is ticking. When the present camp ends he will have just four more before (hopefully) naming his World Cup squad and England cannot arrive at that tournament as ill defined as at Euro 2024.
When it comes to the top of the pitch especially, it feels there’s a need to make early calls — and they will be big ones given the profiles of the players involved — on who plays, what the blend is, and between which colleagues Tuchel sees “love” and “connections” as being strongest.
Because it’s only by identifying the units and playing them together that England may be able to arrive at the World Cup with the same chemistry as the Spain side who beat them in the Euro 2024 final. Tuchel watched Spain lose on penalties to Portugal in Sunday’s Nations League final but raved again about the Spanish players’ level of common purpose and understanding.
It’s the quality he wants for England. “It’s difficult to prescribe freedom, to [say] ‘play with freedom’ and suddenly everyone plays with freedom. We need to get the organisation right and the players right together — that they just feel it naturally and that it’s easy, that it comes easy for them to connect,” he said.
Against Senegal, Saka is expected to start, Kane too. Dean Henderson, Levi Colwill and Declan Rice are also poised to come in, while the plan is for Kyle Walker to play some of the game.
Bellingham missed training on Monday, to attend a family funeral, and England did indeed practise with a smile. Kane and Dan Burn were first out, relaxed and grinning, to the Sir Bobby Charlton pitch at St George’s Park. It was chilly, the sky a white-grey, and cold spots of rain fell. Palmer pulled his sleeves right down over his hands. Anthony Gordon — truly the adopted Geordie — was the only one with bare arms and a short-sleeved shirt.
Senegal may be exactly what Tuchel needs, in that they are a side with pace and flair with players like Nicolas Jackson, Ismaila Sarr and Iliman Ndiaye, who like to stretch the game and play. It will be a relief after three matches against unambitious, low-block, spoiling teams. On Sunday Tuchel and his players delayed eating dinner because they were transfixed by the French Open tennis final. Maybe Carlos Alcaraz is the inspiration they need to play without fear.
The big early calls? For all England’s fantasy options it may just be, in reality, that there is room for only one of Bellingham/Palmer/Foden in the World Cup starting XI. Tuchel likes wingers who stay wide, beat men, and penetrate behind, and is even interested in trying 4-4-2 sometime. Is it really in his thinking to start with more than one No10?
If not, it may be good to establish the pecking order soon and to settle what the forward unit is going to be, to work on that love and connection.
Read more
Fans are perplexed by seeing a Palmer in an England shirt who seems far removed from the Chelsea version, and a Foden who looks nothing like the City Foden, and Bellingham who is not the Real Madrid Bellingham often enough.
“That’s the question that needs to be answered,” Tuchel said. “At the moment, I think even Cole struggled lately at Chelsea. Phil, unfortunately, struggled over many months now [at City]. So the question would always be, do we then invite them and create an atmosphere that they can still perform here? But then I need to know the players more.
“Do we have all the answers at the moment? No. It’s also not necessary to have all the answers now, we’re figuring it out, we’re taking everything into account. The best way is to keep going, encourage everybody. We will try some stuff tomorrow and once we feel we have it, we will get going.”
Possible England XI
(4-2-3-1): D Henderson — K Walker, T Chalobah, L Colwill, M Lewis-Skelly — D Rice, C Gallagher — B Saka, M Gibbs-White, A Gordon — H Kane.
England v Senegal
Friendly, City Ground
Tuesday, kick-off 7.45pm
TV ITV1
