New Delhi: While international media focused on the Lionels—Messi and Scaloni—masterminding yet another late comeback win for Argentina, the English press had sharpened their knives for their Three Lions.
Event Context
Be it The Guardian, The Telegraph or The Times, newspapers across the spectrum have unfavourably compared Tuchel to his predecessor Gareth Southgate—who transformed the culture of the English team since his appointment in 2016 and led England to a semifinal defeat in his first World Cup two years later.
These criticisms intensified in the wake of England’s numerous tournament defeats, especially in games where they took the lead—as was the case against Croatia in the 2018 World Cup and Italy in Euro 2020.
As far as the English press is concerned, Tuchel was hired in order to go one better than Southgate—based on his Champions League success with Chelsea in 2021, and taking Paris Saint-Germain to their first ever final in 2020.
Thus, the manner of defeat—apparently repeating Southgate’s errors—is so unacceptable to them that Tuchel’s position is already untenable. The fact that no foreign manager of a national team has ever won the World Cup is another apparent mark against the German.
Around that time, Declan Rice, Reece James, Morgan Rogers and Kane likely should have made way for Kobbie Mainoo, Nico O’Reilly, Dan Burn and Ollie Watkins. These are in order to put in place a more coherent 5-3-2 formation with wingbacks, that allows for sufficient outlets for better ball retention in midfield and two-pronged counter-attacks.
It also leaves enough room to bring on Marcus Rashford or Ivan Toney as the final sub later on. But there are still no guarantees that this version of an English low block would have successfully held onto a slender lead against the defending champions for more than 30 minutes.
The decision to wait until the final hydration break instead of immediately committing to substitutions is the closest tactical similarity between Tuchel and Southgate. However, rather than exposing them as timid coaches, this loss reflects an inconvenient challenge that the English press are yet to adjust their expectations to—how to overcome Scaloni’s ever-intensifying system.
Player Focus
The Daily Mail, for instance, targeted the England captain Harry Kane’s ineffective performance, with the headline ‘Kane Is Not Able’. The Sun said ‘Wonderbawl’—a jab at English fans’ preferred post-victory song. But most publications squarely placed the blame on head coach Thomas Tuchel for focusing on protecting the 1-0 lead by making defensive substitutions.
A common criticism of Southgate’s management style throughout his eight-year tenure was his failure to control the pace of a game, allowing momentum to drift away from England instead of instilling a more relentlessly attacking style.
Outrage sells, but such analyses belie how the game actually went for England. In his post-match interview, Tuchel said his players got too passive on the ball almost immediately after Gordon opened the scoring. Argentina’s dominance in possession and chance creation grew for 17 minutes before Tuchel first made any defensive substitutions—in an attempt to create a better low-block by instituting a back five.
While some of this can be put down to the English being stuck in a similar regressive mentality as the Southgate era, it fails to account for the primary issue Tuchel had to address—player exhaustion. England’s endurance issues past the hour mark have cropped up ever since they had to adapt to a higher altitude in Mexico City, followed by the humidity of Miami Gardens. Their tiredness wasn’t punished by Mexico or Norway, but Scaloni’s high octane press masters are a relatively insurmountable challenge under the circumstances.
As identified by Michael Cox for The Athletic, England’s initial gameplan of matching the Argentine press was positive in ensuring that Messi and co. wouldn’t control the game too early. But in turn, it hastened England’s poor endurance, technical deficiencies in possession and tendency to drop deep into their own box after Gordon’s goal.
With the benefit of hindsight, Tuchel’s gravest error was perhaps not being immediately proactive by bringing on fresh runners as soon as fullback Djed Spence was forced into a last-ditch defensive tackle on midfielder Giuliano Simeone in the 57th minute.
