England Expects
Is German master tactician Thomas Tuchel the man to guide the Three Lions to World Cup glory?
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- Simon Barnes
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When Thomas Tuchel replaced Frank Lampard as the manager of Chelsea in January 2021, the club’s players were lost and bewildered. Four months later, Chelsea won the Champions League.
If you think that was difficult, you should see the job Tuchel has got now that he’s managing England. All he needs to do if he doesn’t want to be considered a pathetic failure is win the next World Cup.
Hope springs eternal in the English breast, but it soon becomes urgent demand. Ever since 1966, wild hope has preceded desperate disappointment and a furious search for someone to blame.
Sven-Göran Eriksson. Simon Bruty/Anychance/Getty Images
Tuchel becomes the third non-English manager of England, after Sven-Goran Eriksson and Fabio Capello, both of whom endured some bruising times during their tenures. International football may seem a gentle option after the day-in-day-out life at a major club, but there’s nothing like the intensity – and the scrutiny – of a major international tournament. And that rule counts double for England.
But there are some plus points. For a start, no international manager has rows with the hierarchy over transfers. Tuchel has the old-fashioned belief that a football manager, rather than a club’s executives, should be in charge of team matters, and has fallen out with the powers that be at just about every club he has been at. When he starts off, he’s regarded as brilliant, innovative and a perfectionist; a season or two later, he’s said to be difficult and demanding.
Tuchel’s tactical demands can be fearsome
Simon Barnes
In international management it’s more important to have the players on your side. But Tuchel has been known to alienate players as well as directors and higher-ups. His intensity and his tactical demands can be fearsome – and international players don’t have to take that. They can retire from international football and continue a happy, profitable club career. Or there’s always the option of a diplomatic injury.
Playing for England is an honour, but it’s also a burden, often a mighty one. Every major error is noticed by the entire country and regarded as an act of treachery. The erring player will be pilloried in the papers and hung, drawn and quartered on social media. That’s why international players often play the safe pass rather than the telling pass.
Gareth Southgate. Getty Images
Tuchel must follow Gareth Southgate, who steered England through an unprecedented era of confidence, going deep into every tournament: runners-up in the 2020 and 2024 Euros, semi-finalists and quarter-finalists in the 2018 and 2022 World Cups respectively. Southgate’s method was calmness, good sense and good vibes. His lack of intensity and his trust in the players made England consistent, but a rung short of excellent.
Can England take the next step under Tuchel? Will the German’s intelligence, passion for details and soul-deep love of tactics push England towards triumph in the 2026 World Cup hosted by the USA, Mexico and Canada – assuming, of course, that those three nations are still talking.
He starts with as soft a qualification group as could be hoped for, with home fixtures against Albania and Latvia. Andorra and Serbia complete the group. And he has some seriously brilliant attacking players at his disposal. He worked with Harry Kane at Bayern Munich and it would be perverse not to persist with a player who scored 44 goals for him in 45 games.
Phil Foden. Richard Pelham/Getty Images
But who else? He’s got Phil Foden, Cole Palmer and Jude Bellingham: a sort of one-team-three-guvnors situation. Do you play them all in their preferred positions and watch them cancel each other out? Or change things around and alienate the ones who lose out?
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But if it all works, we could yet end up with a stadium full of England football supporters singing the praises of a German. Something to look forward to, eh?
Authors
Simon BarnesAuthor and journalist
Simon Barnes is a sports and wildlife writer, and is the author of a number of books including the recently published The Green Planet
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