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Manager confident match will showcase side’s abilities‘We should play brave and to the strengths of the players’Thomas Tuchel has said the occasion and tension will bring the best out of England when they open their World Cup campaign with an ­awkward game against Croatia on Wednesday.England cruised through ­qualifying, but have a patchy record against top opposition and much to prove before their first encounter in Group L. They have faced top-20 sides on three occasions under Tuchel, drawing with Uruguay and losing to Japan and Senegal.Yet Tuchel is confident ­England will have a different mindset in a competitive game. The German cannot wait for his first World Cup to begin and believes his side will be ready for the challenge posed by ­Croatia under the Dallas Stadium roof.“Because it’s not a friendly match, we will not try stuff,” England’s head coach said. “We will rely on us and the occasion and the tension will bring out the best in us.”Tuchel’s aim is for England to play with the intensity of a Premier League side. “We should play brave and play to the strengths of the players,” he said. “I feel clearly that the players want it and that they are successful in club football like this.“They compete in the ­strongest league, most of them. The others who are not in the league ­compete in the highest level in Europe and ­Champions League and they play in brave and active teams. It makes things excited and creates a ­certain energy and we need a connection with our fans who are here, with the fans at home, to create something special.”England’s carefully planned buildup involved them ­acclimatising to the heat by flying to a Florida for a pre-tournament training camp two weeks ago. They have stepped up preparations at their base in Kansas City and Tuchel, who is expected to start Jude Bellingham over Morgan Rogers at No 10, feels his players require no special messaging about their World Cup starting here.“They know,” he said. “I don’t feel any emotional fuel is needed to make everyone clear what is happening. We know.“I see it even as an advantage that we’re very focused on what we can influence. We don’t put it in the ­bigger picture – just put it where it is. Go day by day, influence what you can ­influence. If we can stay there, I think we have an even ­better chance to compete and perform on our highest level.”England could overpower an ­ageing Croatia side, but they must be wary of the craft of Mateo Kovacic and the 40-year-old Luka Modric in midfield. The 37-year-old Ivan ­Perisic is another danger and scored in ­Croatia’s semi-final win over ­England at the 2018 World Cup.“It is a very difficult start,” Tuchel said. “It is an experienced team, an experienced coach, in tournament knockout football. It’s a top football nation and a very strong opponent. The centre of gravity in their game has dropped a bit, into a back three, we expect.“From a midfield three, which was the core of Croatia, it has only Kovacic and Modric still there. They’re ­playing in a midfield two now. They play with fluid No 10s and wing-backs. But the core is still Modric and Kovacic.“Then they have Perisic, who is always a threat with the crosses. That is one of the most dangerous crossers in world football, maybe – left foot, right foot, he does not even need space to put a cross in. It is ­remarkable. And they are strong in set pieces”.England have been working on their own set-pieces and looked in good shape when they thrashed Costa Rica last week.There are few selection headaches for Tuchel. He must decide whether to risk Bukayo Saka, with the winger troubled by an achilles problem. Noni Madueke is an option to start instead of his Arsenal teammate while Ezri Konsa and John Stones are expected to get the nod over Marc Guéhi in central defence.The full-back Tino Livramento is out of the tournament after ­suffering a muscular injury in ­training; Tuche said scans indicated the Newcastle man would be out for four-to-five weeks. ­Chelsea’s Trevoh Chalobah has been called up in his place, a move that will free up Jarell Quansah to be a full-back option on both sides, together with Djed Spence. Chalobah will come in as a centre-half option.The squad will play a behind-closed-doors game at their Kansas City base on Thursday, Tuchel said, to keep the players who do not get many minutes against Croatia ticking over. The opposition could be the local MLS team, Sporting Kansas City. England did the same thing after their friendly against Costa Rica last Wednesday, when they had a training match against Miami United in Florida the next day. England’s second World Cup group game is not until Tuesday, against Ghana at Boston Stadium.“It is true that we try to play an in-house match after Croatia to use the time [well], we have many days [before the Ghana game],” Tuchel said. “It can give the players who don’t play minutes an extra match load. We did it after the Costa Rica game and we do it one last time on the day after Croatia.”

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England’s ‘footballaholic’ head coach may not be motivated by a fan’s passion but he is more than just a gun for hireIdentity lies at the heart of the World Cup. Who are we and how do we play? Does our academy system work better than yours? What do your coaching pathways look like compared with ours? And do you still get a bit emotional every time you watch that BBC montage of England’s penalty shootout win over Colombia at the 2018 World Cup?Maybe not if you happen to be Thomas Tuchel. This is not a man weighed down by the ghosts of England tournaments past. There is no missed penalty haunting this gangly German intellectual in his sleep, no costly red card in a knockout tie stalking his nightmares. For Tuchel, meaning is found merely in the pursuit of victory. At first glance there is no deeper cultural connection here and, for all the breezy talk of putting a second star on the shirt, there are times when it is hard to understand why Tuchel wants to bring an end to England men’s 60 years of hurt this summer.Of course, winning the World Cup would look good on the CV. The attraction of the job is obvious. The rewards are vast and the players are elite. Yet even if it makes sense on a sporting level, it is still fascinating to consider the wider motivation for Tuchel given it is safe to assume he was not supporting England when they lost those semi-finals to the Germans at Italia 90 and Euro 96.It comes back to the idea that what separates international football from the club game is playing for something bigger. For some, the aim is to go down as a legend in your own country, but Tuchel is not from England. He will not sing the national anthem when England face Croatia in their opening game in Group L in Dallas on Thursday. Will there be criticism from the usual suspects? Perhaps, but Tuchel is unlikely to care. He knows the words – “It is not so difficult,” he said with a grin – and explained that he still feels too shy to join in when the music strikes up.Tuchel’s predecessor brought a different energy. Gareth Southgate almost treated the England job as a higher calling. He spoke about politics and behaved like a man trying to heal the nation. Southgate wrote an open letter about society’s divisions and ended up being played by Joseph Fiennes in the stage and television versions of Dear England.There is none of that with Tuchel. His title is head coach rather than manager. He is not interested in talking about politics and his background means he is never going to become as overwhelmed by the job as Southgate was by the end of his time in charge.Still, though, there are layers to Tuchel. As a young coach he rose through the German pressing school. He has been described as a “footballaholic” and is bright, engaging and funny. His eccentric streak appeals to England’s love of a maverick, yet the willingness to speak his mind can sometimes feel very un-English. It is hard, for instance, to picture Southgate ever calling one of his players repulsive.“Thomas is almost Latin in the way he speaks,” the FA’s technical director, John McDermott, said in Inside England, a book about the team’s journey over the past decade. “There’s a warmth and there’s a tactileness. He comes alive when he’s speaking about the team, the players, the games.”Tuchel did not click with the French media when he managed Paris Saint-Germain and has a reputation for being a hothead in Germany. He fell out with Joshua Kimmich at Bayern Munich and has always sounded ambivalent when talking about German football.England is where he most comes alive. It felt right for Tuchel when he became Chelsea’s manager in January 2021 and led them to Champions League glory four months later. Lockdown measures were still in place, but the 52-year-old talked enthusiastically about wanting to discover London’s bookshops and best coffee spots. “It’s the country, it’s the humour, it’s the way of life,” Tuchel once said of his love of England as a country.He is not putting it on. He likes zooming around the capital on Lime bikes. He has found his favourite gastropub and when he was younger he loved to pretend to be Chris Waddle “with the collar up in my garden” after watching the England winger during the 1990 World Cup.Perhaps Tuchel’s desire to lead England to glory is not such a mystery. Unlike Fabio Capello, he gets the culture. His favourite novel? TC Boyle’s Water Music, a story about a London thief and a Scottish explorer as they seek the source of the Niger River in Africa in the 18th century. The impression is that Tuchel feels a connection with England. Asked if he is an anglophile, he says: “I can’t explain it but it felt like this from the first weeks at Chelsea. It just felt so good to be in the country and a part of the Premier League. Every day was a gift almost.“What the league brings out of players and what the fans expect from the players, the coach made me feel very comfortable. I liked it from the first day. I cannot say often enough, it’s an honour for me to be England head coach. I feel basically at home when I land. I would say now: ‘I fly home.’ I fly home to my home in London. It feels like home when I land in London and I’m in England.”This is more than an expensive gun for hire. Tuchel cares. The longer he stays the less he feels like an outsider.

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Striker will lead England against Croatia at the home of the Dallas Cowboys, seeking to right the wrongs of Qatar 2022There has long been something about the mentality of US sports stars that has appealed to Harry Kane. The England captain sees it as something specific to them: a unique brand of never-say-die spirit. It leans into a broader notion – that anyone can achieve success if they want it badly enough, if they pursue it with all their heart. It is known as the American dream.Kane was introduced to it all in 2011 at the start of his professional career, when the path was anything but smooth at his boyhood club, Tottenham. He had started to become interested in the NFL and there was something about the New England Patriots quarterback, Tom Brady, that transfixed him.Kane watched The Brady 6 documentary. It told the story of how nobody wanted Brady in the 2000 NFL draft. Six other quarterbacks were taken before the Patriots made him the 199th pick. When the show came out, Brady had led the team to three Super Bowls. He would do so on a further four occasions, with Kane travelling to Atlanta in 2019 to watch the Patriots beat the Los Angeles Rams for No 6.Brady invited Kane to the team party afterwards and there is a lovely photograph of them together, Kane wearing a Patriots replica jersey, Brady’s No 12 across the front. The pair have remained in touch ever since. But it is not just Brady, even if he is the principle inspiration. Kane follows other NFL players and other American sports personalities.For Kane, it is the US in general. He is at ease in the country. He remembers going there on his first pre-season tour with Spurs in 2012, when the club played a game in New York and Kane was recognised in the streets. There are a lot of Tottenham fans in the Big Apple. Kane has been drawn back time and again, mainly to New York and Florida, where he loves the golf courses.In New York, he appeared on the Jimmy Fallon show in 2022 and Good Morning America a year later when he talked of wanting to be an NFL kicker after he retired from football. He first mentioned that in 2019 and his words are worth reprinting. “It goes back to that drive to be the best,” he said. “Even if I download a game on my phone, can I be the best in the world? If you play in the Premier League and the World Cup, and you then play in the NFL, would you be considered one of the greatest sportsmen ever?”Kane has lived his version of the American dream on the other side of the pond. The breakthrough at Spurs in 2014. The inexorable rise to become the face of the England team; the record goalscorer. The big money move to Bayern Munich in 2023. The titles with the Bundesliga club.“People didn’t expect much from Tom Brady,” Kane says. “Seeing the way he went about his business, his journey from the start … to go on and be the greatest ever player in his sport is maybe reminiscent of me earlier in my career. In that people doubted me and I worked hard to turn that around.“In terms of the US, it’s how open it is from the athlete and media point of view. Everyone wears their heart on their sleeve and they are maybe more honest in how they talk in the media. I enjoy being here. I’ve had good experiences in pre-season. I come here on holiday a bit to play golf. It’s been good memories.”Kane’s real American dream will begin at Dallas Stadium on Wednesday when he leads England out for their World Cup opener against Croatia. It feels appropriate that it is an NFL arena, the home of the Dallas Cowboys. Albeit not as appropriate as if it were the Patriots’ Gillette Stadium in Foxborough. England play their second group game there against Ghana next Tuesday. “That’s probably the one I’m excited to go to being a Patriots fan,” Kane says. “I’ve never been to the Gillette Stadium before.”There is certainly excitement for Kane and yet it is underpinned by conviction. There is something about the way he carries himself these days. The humility endures; a product of his upbringing, his struggles. But there is an awareness of his place in the global game, especially after the season he has had – 61 goals in 51 appearances for Bayern and a second Bundesliga title. The DFB-Pokal, too.Kane had played in five major finals – three for Spurs, including one in the Champions League; two for England, both at the European Championship. He lost all five, failing to score in any of them. In May, he bagged a second-half hat-trick in Bayern’s 3-0 win over Stuttgart.The 32-year-old has never been so prolific. His previous best for a season at club level was the 44 he got for Bayern in 2023-24. He is getting better with age and there is talk of the Ballon d’Or if the World Cup goes well. Of greatness. After winning nothing at Spurs, Kane knows he is viewed differently. It is a source of strength.“There’s a different feeling, for sure,” Kane says. “For me to have that weight off my shoulders [having won things at Bayern] is important. Especially this year having the trophies and having the cup final where I scored a hat-trick – my first big moment in a final. The perception around me has probably changed in the last few years.”Kane will win his 115th cap against Croatia, moving him to joint-third on the all-time England list, level with David Beckham, one of his heroes. Kane went to the same school in Chingford, east London. Only Peter Shilton (125) and Wayne Rooney (120) have played more for England. Of Kane’s 79 goals for his country, nine have come in the knockout rounds of World Cups and Euros. No other player in history has more than eight. Kane, on eight, is closing in on Gary Lineker’s World Cup record of 10 for England.“I’m coming into this tournament in the best way possible; the best place physically and mentally,” Kane says. “Throughout a career, there aren’t loads of times when all the pieces of the puzzle will come together at the right moment. Talking now, I feel like I’m in that place.“With every tournament, I always feel under pressure being the goalscorer … people expect you to score and help the team and I guess this year is no different. But I’m comfortable having that responsibility. I’m probably even more comfortable going into this year because of the way the season was for me.”Kane dwelt for a moment on the famous photograph of him as an 11-year-old with Beckham in 2005. It was at the launch of Beckham’s football academy. Also in the picture was Katie Goodland – Kane’s future wife. “Looking back on that with me and him and obviously my wife there, who was just a friend at the time … it’s a pretty crazy picture.”Kane’s journey with England has taken in five previous tournaments, starting with Euro 2016, and he found himself admitting that he holds on to the low points more tightly. The lowest was his critical penalty miss in the quarter-final loss to France at the 2022 World Cup.“The downs have almost motivated me [more] to be better, going back to the last World Cup and the disappointment with the way that ended,” he says. “After the time it took me to process it all and move on, it gave me an extra bite, an extra edge to really improve and push on.”Kane is more about looking ahead. The ultimate dream bubbles. What will be his final words in the dressing room before the team steps out against Croatia? “The messaging will be to go with freedom,” he says. “We have an extremely strong team, a physical team. That’s going to be a big aspect of our game, so go out there and use that. We’re here to go far, that’s our goal.“The only regrets you can have coming away from tournaments is that you didn’t go for it. You can make mistakes. You can miss penalties like I’ve missed. But I don’t think those are the moments that stop you from sleeping at night.“It’s the ones where you feel like you could have given more, you could have been a bit more free, you could have just gone for it. When you lose, you lose anyway. I’d rather lose giving it everything, showing my best abilities, whether you make mistakes or not. The message is just to be free and don’t be afraid of any outcome. Then, we’ll have a great chance.”

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Hanging flags on LED advertising boards not allowedEngland fans face having flags confiscated when they attend their opening game of the World Cup against Croatia at Dallas Stadium on Wednesday.The England Supporters Club (ESC) is understood to have been advised by stadium officials that fans will not be allowed to hang flags over the LED advertising boards that surround the pitch, with only small flags to be allowed into the ground, which must be hung on rails behind the goals.The ESC has arranged for several large banners and flags to be displayed behind the goals, but casual supporters attempting to bring a flag into the ground are likely to have them confiscated.A number of Dutch and Japanese fans had flags confiscated at Dallas Stadium when attending the 2-2 draw on Sunday, but there have been no issues bringing them in at other grounds.Fifa’s tournament guide for fans states: “Small flags, banners and posters made of a fire-resistant material are allowed in the stadium. Larger flags, banners, posters or instruments must be approved in advance.”Ronan Evain, executive director of Football Supporters Europe, who was at the first game in Dallas, complained of a lack of consistency in enforcing Fifa’s guidelines. “You were not really allowed to bring a flag in, or at least to show it, which is inconsistent with most Fifa rules and regulations, but also what was allowed at previous tournaments,” Evain said. “Most of the flags were removed by the staff.“At a lot of the stadiums it hasn’t been a problem, so it’s hard to understand what is the actual policy and what is improvisation by the staff locally with the rules that they now have. The broader problem – and I think it’s a demonstration of how much Fifa has little control over this tournament – is that there’s no consistent rule, and when you look at what Fifa has published, there’s a code of conduct that is very broad.“But it never clarified a lot of things, like what sort of symbols are allowed and not allowed? Are you able to bring a flag of your region or city or club? A lot of this is still up in the air, and I think there’s a bit of learning by the venues, but also, again, inconsistency.”

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Tuchel’s multicultural squad are less burdened by narrative than previous teams and can embrace the chance to live in the momentNice World Cup you’ve got there. Be a shame if something … happened to it. The opening acts of this bloated, roided-up summer tournament have been surprisingly fun, light and sparky.Surprising, that is, if you’ve absorbed much of its doom-laden buildup. Football always does this. There is a reason this sport has become humanity’s great brain-wipe distractor ray, the tool of mega-brands and jumped-up administrators with a Football Jesus fetish. You can stretch it thin, loan it out to despotic regimes. But the games will still be good. Football remains an indestructible substance.So we’ve had joy and Cape Verdean tears, bow tie-twirling host nation razzmatazz, fans who seem, of all things, just happy to be here. In the United States the World Cup has felt like just another high functioning element of the leisure-sphere. It’s David Beckham selling chainsaws, crisps and beer. It’s Chuck Flipburger beaming into a camera outside the Anusol Megadrome saying: “Spain’s super-duper-star Lamine Yarrmaarrrl.”Even the games have been fearless and flowing and not, for example, dominated by a weird sense that everyone has their legs on backwards, that the ball is filled with helium and fear, that the whole experience is analogous to stabbing yourself in both eyes with a knitting needle made from pork-pie meat and self-loathing. Yeah, well. Enjoy that while you can.You can sit there playing with your silly little machines as much as you like. I’ll show you a World Cup. Close to a week in, with almost an entire round of cloudless group games in the bag, the coffin lid is starting to creak. By late Monday morning the first little knots of Three Lions shirts could be seen wandering the blank, baking streets of Dallas, blinking in the light. England are at the door. And it’s time for a vibe shift.Well, maybe. England will play Croatia on Wednesday at the Dallas Stadium, a thrillingly vast concrete dome dumped down in the low, throbbing plains to the south of the city. It is a genuinely spectacular venue, sealed on all sides beneath its swooping panelled roof, with the feel inside of a vast and humid tropical shed, a place to keep your pet stegosaurus.That Group L opener will be England’s first proper game in two years, a first meaningful regeneration of the England football identity since the last days of Gareth in Berlin, and as ever an opportunity to find out two things. First: are they any good? And second: what will it feel like? What is the energy? How much will it hurt? More importantly this time around, will people still care like they’re supposed to care?This has been the dualism of England football. Results can often seem like a distracting subplot from England content, England feelings, the idea that every tournament appearance is an angst-ridden referendum on national identity. Euro 2024 was the perfect example, marked by howls of frustration, booing of the players, hatred of the manager, blocked systems, basically just a disaster; but simultaneously the most successful overseas men’s tournament ever.There has been a shift in the nature of this. Interest in England football drops through the floor between tournaments these days but returns in reliably feverish form once the games begin. The change is also textural. You wouldn’t write a song about “hurt” any more. Younger people don’t feel the same bruised and helpless longing for victory. The England women’s team have won two tournaments. Club football and celebrity player-fawning have entered that space.The signifiers of England fandom, the songs, the yearning, the beer in the air, have been ritualised, transformed into a semi-ironical costume party, another way of going to the pub. This is not to say extreme England fandom has dissipated. People still love and follow the team. But this has also been radicalised on the fringes.It is worth noting a strange online event that flared up around England’s pre-World Cup friendlies, one that may come again now, and which speaks also to a defining early note of this World Cup. In the days after England’s 1-0 victory over New Zealand in Tampa there was a surge of nakedly racist posts, mainly on X, about England’s players not singing the national anthem, or singing it with insufficient gusto. Thomas Tuchel was asked about this in Kansas City and shrugged it off.But it is now out here, a lever, a wedge for targeted division. It feels even more jarring at a World Cup where there has already been a great deal of chat about cross-border nationality, about countries as porous, mutable things: the Swedish-Tunisian scoring goals for Sweden against Tunisia, the Curaçao team of dual-nationality Dutch.This is not a loss of shape, or a blurring of meaning, or the dissolution of the World Cup as a robust entity. This is the World Cup telling us what countries are, what countries have done, how countries become countries.England have a remarkable squad in many ways, one that reflects clearly the history of the nation. Of 26 players, 20 had the option to play for another country under Fifa heritage rules. Eight have Caribbean ancestry, 10 African, four Irish and three Scottish. A record low number, six of 26, are English and only English. It takes a wilful ignorance of history to interpret this as some kind of betrayal, migrant opportunism, or whatever the line is. It is instead a fine-point portrait of what England is and has been.Here’s an interesting stat. This World Cup is being contested by 48 nations. At some point in its relentlessly feisty imperial history, England or Britain have either invaded, occupied or taken military action against 44 of them (albeit this requires the broadest definition of all these things). The exceptions are Sweden, Uzbekistan and Côte d’Ivoire, who should all probably be watching their backs right now, particularly you, Sweden.And England aren’t alone here. Belgium have five players of Congolese descent, not because of some random insurgency but because Belgium effected a violent occupation of Congo for 75 years. Similarly, Curaçao’s rise on the back of its Dutch dual-heritage diaspora isn’t a haggle or a cheat, but instead a legacy of the slave trade and the Dutch presence in the Caribbean, the cradle of Dutch wealth, the birth of the modern nation. The World Cup is teaching us about the world here, giving us a map of how those borders were made and reinforced.All of which makes the question of who does or doesn’t sing a song before a football match seem a little by-the-by. Never mind that singing the anthem hasn’t really done much good anyway; every one of the great canonical defeats was accompanied by Tony Adams or similar belting it out on a roasting foreign field.The anthem does, however, lead into the more fun side of the tournament. Are England a better, lighter, more adaptable team now? Englishness was Southgate’s key obsession, to the extent his “where art thou, England?” stuff may have become a limiting factor by the end. Even this week’s pre-tournament message, putting himself centre stage by insisting he doesn’t want to be centre stage, felt a bit like your dear old dying dad passive-aggressively insisting he doesn’t want any flowers when he’s gone. No really, don’t even think about me.Now England have Tuchel, who really doesn’t care and who is in his state of extreme pragmatism probably closer to this generation of players. Premier League hype-derangement aside, England are somewhere between fifth and eighth favourites to win the World Cup, behind France, Spain, Argentina and Portugal and level-ish with the Netherlands, Germany, Brazil, Morocco and Belgium.They have four very good players: Harry Kane, Declan Rice, Reece James and Jude Bellingham, plus a very reliable tournament goalkeeper. The midfield still lacks the extreme possession-based craft that wins tight knockout games. A semi-final would be a fine achievement. A quarter-final would be par, although even this may involve beating Mexico in Mexico City and Brazil in Miami.One key plus point: the episodic, broken-up nature of play might suit Tuchel’s style, his interest in set pieces, the barked in-game battleship manoeuvres, the gangling arms at the drinks break. Much will depend on how Kane and Bellingham work together, how willing Bellingham is to make runs without the ball, to vacate the spaces where Kane likes to lurk.Best of all, nothing is coming home here, because nothing ever was coming home, because there is nothing to come home. The team reflects the country, in so far as anything can reflect a country. Expectations seem reassuringly room temperature. Perhaps, for once, England may even have a single-track tournament experience, live in the moment, not the Arthurian past, and rise or fall simply on the merits of here and now.

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Tuchel warns forward’s fitness being carefully monitoredSaka keen to play but not to ‘go against the manager’Bukayo Saka has admitted he is continuing to gamble on his fitness to play for England at the World Cup finals but said he “is ready to go” despite a nagging achilles injury.The Arsenal forward came off the bench in England’s last warm‑up game against Costa Rica but the England manager, Thomas Tuchel, warned that Saka’s fitness is being monitored carefully. The 24‑year‑old player is believed to have picked up the injury during the Carabao Cup final against Manchester City in March and missed Arsenal’s next seven matches as a result. Since then, he has completed 90 minutes only once in five appearances and was substituted before the end of normal time in the Champions League final against Paris Saint-Germain.Asked whether he agreed with Tuchel’s suggestion that he was not ready to play an entire match, Saka said: “I don’t want to say anything that goes against the manager. But what I would say between Mikel [Arteta] and Arsenal’s medical team and England’s medical team, since March they have managed me ­amazingly and helped me get back on the pitch and do what I can for the team. I am feeling better than I have felt for the last few months. I am ready to go.”Saka acknowledged, though, that he has been playing through the pain barrier. “As players it’s the biggest gamble, especially if you’re not feeling your sharpest. You have the choice whether you don’t play or you put yourself out there knowing people are going to judge you the same.“At the end of the day people don’t really care how you’re ­feeling, they expect you to deliver, they expect you to perform. I’m happy to take the gamble. It paid off, I’d say. I’m going to continue doing that. But I am feeling a lot better than I did in March and I’m ready to go.”Noni Madueke could start in place of Saka on the right side of England’s attack if Tuchel decides not to risk Saka against ­Croatia on Wednesday in Dallas. The two of them, Declan Rice and Eberechi Eze were all given extra time off after Arsenal’s Champions League commitments and Saka believes that winning the club’s first Premier League title for 22 years has given them “more confidence and freedom”. He said: “Knowing what it takes to win is important, and we have that feeling now. It gives you more belief.”John Stones is expected to start his 25th tournament game in a row despite being used sparingly by City this season. The 32-year-old has revealed previously that he even considered retiring at the end of last season but is now determined to play his part for England.“City didn’t want to keep me any more and wanted me to find a new challenge,” he told ITV.“I said to myself: ‘OK, I could do that and find somewhere.’ Or what did I do as a kid when you played down for two years, wasn’t big enough, played out of position, what did you do? I fought and that’s what I did and I have always reflected on that. I think I feel as good as I’ve ever been before a tournament.”

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FA opted for a city Thomas Tuchel’s side have no group matches in but have emphasised home comforts for players to feel at easeThe first thing to say about England in Kansas City is that the locals seem genuinely delighted to have them here. The welcome for Thomas Tuchel and his players has been warm, coloured by the charm and friendliness of the midwest.Yet there is also a question that people have asked, particularly those who are connected to Argentina, the Netherlands and Algeria – the other World Cup nations who have chosen to base themselves in this area. Why are England here? Unlike the trio, they have no group matches at the city’s Arrowhead Stadium.There are several strands to the answer which, when put together, convinced the Football Association that Kansas City would provide the surest springboard to glory at what is the most bloated and challenging World Cup of them all.The governing body like Kansas City’s central location, knowing it will mitigate the travel distances to and from games; England will not have any flights of more than three-and-a-half hours. The countries that choose to ground-hop in the knockout rounds rather than return to a fixed base as England plan to do could find themselves looking at some unappealing journeys.The FA believe there is a significant advantage to having an actual home – or at least a home from home – previous tournaments have shown them this. It will mean, for example, that staff do not have to lug their equipment around every three to five days; a physical and mental challenge. The fact England kick-off their three group games in mid-to-late afternoon (local time) means they ought to get back to Kansas City at a reasonable hour afterwards.The emphasis, really, is on home comforts, which the FA have sought to push at the team hotel – the four-star, 54-room Inn at Meadowbrook, which the squad have taken exclusively. There is plenty of outdoor space, freedom for the players to get out in the fresh air; perhaps for a game of basketball – the FA have had a hoop installed.There are communal spaces, including some with screens to watch the World Cup or, indeed, other sports. There is an area for recovery, with a sauna and places for relaxation. And then there are the little touches, including those that greeted the players when they checked in on Saturday.“There was an iPad in my room with photos on it – like a slideshow,” said the backup goalkeeper James Trafford. “The first photo was me and my missus. It was a nice surprise. Then I had a box that my missus did for me … with little personal touches. What was in it? She put a few things in to open at different stages of the tournament – a thing for every week. She put two face masks in there, as well. Very thoughtful. And she put in a Lego set of a tractor.”Trafford hails from farming stock in Cumbria and can actually drive a tractor. “I’m a farmer, aren’t I?” he said. “It’s not the biggest Lego tractor and I haven’t built it yet. We’ve only just got here. I don’t want to jump the gun.”Tuchel’s No 1 goalkeeper, Jordan Pickford, said the mood in the camp was “in a great place”. He added in an interview with TalkSport: “The FA put a lot of hard work in behind the scenes … what a lot of the media, the fans and the people at home don’t see. I’ve got to pay massive credit to that because it makes it feel like home. Even just little things like the family box, which was obviously from my wife, Megan, and the kids. What was in mine? Haribos! Some nice bits, some photos and some cards.”Pickford has been a fixture in the team since the 2018 World Cup and is now at his fifth major international tournament finals. “I’ve always said in tournaments that it’s not smooth sailing,” he said. “It’s always going to be a rollercoaster. People will have down days, you might be sick of each other for the odd day, that’s part and parcel of it.“But this camp with this manager … he’ll keep pushing that brotherhood and it’s down to the players to keep driving it. I love every minute when I’m away. Having a crowd of lads, having a bit of fun. Even if I’m getting battered myself, I’ll take it on the chin.”

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Gareth Southgate was looking to the future when he dropped midfielder but, as Jude Bellingham says, the veteran’s influence is indispensableThe cat is well truly out of the bag. Nobody expected the conversation to be quite so revealing when Jude Bellingham and Morgan Rogers sat on the Lions’ Den sofa last week. Content controlled by the Football Association was an unlikely place for Bellingham to drop a few truth bombs, but the England midfielder was not minded to hold back when it was time to discuss his experience at Euro 2024.“It didn’t feel like there was any kind of hierarchy,” the 22-year-old said. “I think at the Euros we got some things a little bit wrong off the pitch. I don’t feel like the group connected as well as it could have – for a number of reasons.”And there it was. That there were issues within the camp two years ago was not exactly a jaw-dropping revelation but to hear one of the squad’s most important players being open about it before England attempt to win the World Cup was significant.“We weren’t playing particularly well, which doesn’t help,” Bellingham said. “Even when we were winning we didn’t get the feeling that we were as happy as we should be. You want to win, but the nature of football is that wins go out of the system very quickly.”England never held on to the feeling. The vibe was off and the lack of connection was palpable. England were confused and the warning signs were there when they set off for Germany, summed up by Gareth Southgate having to take Harry Kane for a walk around Tottenham’s training ground to explain the thinking behind his squad for the tournament.The generous description of Southgate’s decisions would be bold. A more accurate assessment, though, is that he completely lost sight of who he was as a manager. After putting so much store into creating the right culture around the camp, there was shock when he picked a host of youngsters with little experience of international football and dropped Harry Maguire, Jack Grealish, Marcus Rashford and, most importantly of all, Jordan Henderson.England never found a way to operate without Henderson’s leadership. They toiled before their luck ran out in their defeat to Spain in the final. Bellingham produced brilliant moments but there were times when petulance crept into his game. The impression was of a kid who needed a senior pro to put an arm around his shoulder. Henderson, who is extremely protective of Bellingham, was missed; no wonder Kane was so relieved when Thomas Tuchel decided his first big call after replacing Southgate as head coach would be to bring the former Liverpool midfielder back into the fold.Tuchel had spent a lot of time trying to understand why England played with such little identity. The German listened and concluded that creating the right atmosphere off the pitch would be much easier with Henderson around to keep standards high in the dressing room.Henderson turns 36 when England face Croatia in their opening game at the World Cup on Wednesday. The Brentford midfielder is not a starter and has lost some of his running power. The accusation is that Henderson is only in the US to lay out the cones and act as Bellingham’s minder. Plenty of fans felt his international career should have been over when he left Liverpool for the Saudi Pro League in 2023.Those views persist. Why not look to the future and pick Adam Wharton? The answer lies in how much Henderson is respected by his teammates. Tuchel has looked into group dynamics. He has repeatedly talked about creating a brotherhood and has noted that players come out of their shell when Henderson is in the camp.Bellingham and Rogers used their Lions’ Den appearance to call Henderson the best person they have ever met in football. Both talked about how much he does behind the scenes. Henderson is the glue holding everything together and he exuded authority when he spoke to the media for 25 minutes at England’s training base in Kansas City on Monday.He defended Bellingham, saying external perceptions of the 22-year-old’s character are well off beam. He was effusive about the influence of Declan Rice, who has been named England’s new vice-captain. “It’s important to make sure the culture off the pitch is good but that’s not down to one person,” Henderson said. “Everyone has a role to play. It’s creating a culture to keep driving each other forward.”Henderson brought the intensity when England played Miami FC in a behind closed doors friendly last Thursday. A day before, he had watched from the sidelines as Tuchel’s side crushed Costa Rica in Tampa. “When I look back at pre-tournament games, that is the very best I’ve seen,” Henderson said. “It’s about taking that into Croatia.”Tuchel says pressing is key to England’s identity. Bellingham, selected over Rogers at No 10, was exceptional without the ball. He was key to an excellent display and looks to be in a much better place than at the Euros.England know all too well that tournaments can hinge on making sure the mood in the camp is right. Tuchel has focused so much on character. He has picked hungry players. He wants healthy competition. His decision not to select Maguire looked smart when the defender spoke out about his omission on social media. Henderson no doubt resents the idea he is little more than a glorified cheerleader. He will feel he can still contribute on the pitch, even if his role is to come off the bench to help with game management.Even so, it is impossible not to feel that Henderson’s leadership behind the scenes will be crucial. Southgate underestimated him. Having initially stood by Henderson after his move to Saudi Arabia, he changed his mind just before the Euros and decided he was no longer fit enough to merit selection.Southgate lost sight of Henderson’s personality. Listening to Bellingham, it is clear to see why Tuchel did not make the same mistake.

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Midfielder expects Madrid man to have major impactHenderson: ‘He’s a huge player for us in this tournament’Jordan Henderson says Jude Bellingham is loved by his teammates and will be England’s X-factor at the World Cup.Bellingham, who is vying with Morgan Rogers to start at No 10 against Croatia on Wednesday, has been the subject of plenty of debate at international level during the past two years. There has been speculation about the Real Madrid star’s relationship with Thomas Tuchel, but Henderson is close with the midfielder and insists there is no issue with his attitude.“I’m sure he will have a big impact for us in this tournament,” Henderson said. “I can remember five years ago I gave him his first cap, it was away at Middlesbrough. How much he’s grown, as a player and as a person since then, is incredible really. I had a good idea when I first saw him playing and training, and the way he was.“I think everybody forgets how young he is. We do rondos and it’s the youngest in, and there’s people that I think should be going in before him, but he’s always one of the first in the middle to go in. It just reminds us how young he is. I honestly couldn’t speak highly enough of him.“I know a lot gets written in the media and I really find it hard to read sometimes because I just know how big an influence he is on this team, how good a teammate he is off the field. And what he gives us is just something really special, he really gives us the X-factor in our team. He’s had big moments in his career, he’s a big game player, he’s got experience in tournaments, so he’s a huge, huge player for us in this tournament.”Henderson insisted that external perceptions of Bellingham as a divisive influence are inaccurate. Bellingham was praised for looking after Alex Scott, Ethan Nwaneri, Rio Ngumoha and Josh King when the youngsters were part of England’s pre-tournament training camp.“If you ask any player in the group, they’ll tell you how much of a good teammate he is, how well he trains,” Henderson said. I know he’s young but he’s very mature. He helps young players, new players, that are coming in. How he was in the pre-camp with Rio, Josh King, Alex Scott, Ethan, how he is with those players, nobody sees that, but they all look up to him.“He gave Rio his first cap after the game, which just gives you a little insight into what he is like behind the scenes. I do think a lot of the media and the stuff that gets written isn’t all true to be honest, or a lot of it is actually untrue. But for us we all know what he can do, and how much we all love him inside the camp, and I suppose that’s the main thing.”Henderson addressed the battle between Bellingham and Rogers to start. “It doesn’t mater if you’re starting or coming on, everyone has a role,” he said. “I see it as two top players who I wouldn’t want to be playing against – so good on and off the ball, athletic and physical, can score and have it in their locker to produce big moments. They’re very close and will support each other 100%. They’ve both got a big role to play.”