Tuchel, perhaps understandably, made 10 changes for the friendly with Senegal, but there are few decisions he has taken since assuming control that can be described as successful.<\/p>\n
Others, meanwhile, have been simply head-scratching.<\/p>\n
The recall of Jordan Henderson, who turns 35 next week, was mystifying and raised questions about whether Tuchel believes he has enough leaders in his squad, even flagging up the veteran’s influence in training.<\/p>\n
The Ajax midfielder made his first start for England since 17 November 2023 against Andorra but had little impact or influence. Surely this experiment with a fine international servant is over.<\/p>\n
And if ever a player performed in the manner that suggested his England career is coming to a close, it was the cruel exposure of 35-year-old Kyle Walker against Senegal on his 96th appearance.<\/p>\n
The right-back was the first player to appear for England aged 35 or over since Frank Lampard in June 2014.<\/p>\n
Walker, who has struggled on loan at AC Milan from Manchester City, switched off at the far post when Ismaila Sarr equalised for Senegal and was then booked for a wild challenge before being subsequently targeted by the visitors.<\/p>\n
What does this say about Tuchel’s opinion of Trent Alexander-Arnold, who saw his former Liverpool team-mate Curtis Jones selected ahead of him at right-back against Andorra, with Walker then preferred on Tuesday night?<\/p>\n
Tuchel is clearly unconvinced by the new Real Madrid’s signing’s defensive qualities, but surely he offers more than the fading, slowing Walker and a midfielder in Jones pressed into service in his position.<\/p>\n
Chelsea captain Reece James is another right-back option, but Tuchel chose to deploy him as a makeshift left-back against Andorra.<\/p>\n
On current evidence, there can be no place for either Henderson or Walker at the World Cup. Time has caught up with them.<\/p>\n
Striker Ivan Toney was summoned from Al-Ahli and the Saudi Pro League as Tuchel tested out alternatives to the ever-reliable Harry Kane, but the former Brentford player was called into action only in the 88th minute at the end of this Senegal setback.<\/p>\n
Once again, a puzzling move from Tuchel.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tuchel, perhaps understandably, made 10 changes for the friendly with Senegal, but there are few decisions he has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":174749,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4100],"tags":[94,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-174748","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-football","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114662891089146210","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174748","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=174748"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174748\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/174749"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=174748"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=174748"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=174748"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}