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Kobbie Mainoo is ruled out of today’s matchday squad to face France due to injury.

I always find it fascinating to watch a team’s dynamic shift when their best player is out. Know this is a less serious game but Jude Bellingham was the best England player in the World Cup, Kane arguably up there too. But sometimes you get more natural collectives in those absences.





Thomas Tuchel talks. No regrets but plenty of pain, a plea for perspective, insistence he will not quit and belief that players hit by intensity of schedule. It's draining men. 48 hours after defeat to Argentina, England’s embattled head coach tried to answer his critics when talking last night on arrival here in Miami in advance of today’s World Cup third-place play-off against France. Tuchel refused to say whether Atlanta was “the most painful experience” of his football career. “I don't know. I had a lot of painful ones and it wouldn't be the last one.” Report from Miami. Main lines of questioning and TT answers… RESPONSIBLE. Who was responsible for England dropping off and for the defeat? Players or coach? “Listen, if it's easier, if someone takes the blame, I take the blame. No problem. This is the deal that you signed up for, as I understand it. "You have every right to do so (criticise), but I will not engage in this kind of game. For me, there's no one to blame. If you need someone to blame, I'll take the responsibility. I’m the head coach. If ‘drama’ is needed, if a blame game needs to be played, OK, we can do that, but I have the right to not engage with that.” SCAR. The pain remained. It’s a scar. “It’s a shock in the beginning. It's becoming more, more painful every single day. It will be a scar for us. Unfortunately, not the first one, and very likely, not the last one. This is what it is in high-level sports. We have to live with this. It’s our pain, my pain, the players’ pain, we feel the most pain of all. It is our scar that we carry. We have to live with this defeat, not the critics, not the experts, not our family members who suffer with us, and want only the best for us, but it's basically us.” NO REGRETS. Any regrets on his defensive substitutions when England were 1-0 up against Argentina? “I don't regret my decisions, because I felt that we become too passive, the momentum switches and I try to help my team. I took several decisions, trusting my instinct, my intuition, my experience, my trust in my competitiveness, and I took the decision to help the team and get the results. "We didn't get the result. So I take the responsibility for all these decisions. But the decisions are made under stress, the decisions are made in-game. I would regret if I didn't help, I would regret if we didn't react. But I have no regrets over the decisions.” PERSPECTIVE. A plea for perspective. “It's not so long ago that we were in front of 1000s and 1000s of fans in America, singing Wonderwall, right? What these players built in the last six-and-a-half weeks was just on the highest level in terms of togetherness, in terms of skill. This represents me and my values. We have to take the next step and play better football under pressure of the football in tournaments. We have another level to reach. “Maybe it's worth to put it into context. We lost the first official match together since 14 matches. We played in the semi-final against the world champions. We were (at) 85 minutes, 1-0 up. We played against the best player in the world. We are one of the top-four nations. France, Spain and Argentina expect to win the title. We were hoping, we would dream. We are not there yet. There is still a gap to close. And this is what we will do.” REACTION. What will England’s reaction be, starting against France? “I am competitive. Every player is competitive. We will have a reaction, and it starts from tomorrow. We will not stop chasing, hunting, challenging. If we win, we (England) have the best results of the World Cups in 60 years. That's the perspective, yes. We will show that the mentality is real, the spirit is real, and the togetherness that we have built is not to be questioned." PASSIVE. So what went wrong against Argentina? “We became too passive in the last 30 minutes. We could not get hold of the ball, we could not find duels anymore. Argentina had a lot of offensive changes and a lot of offensive positions. They were chasing a goal, the substitutes became more and more offensive. We could not stop the crosses and we could not stop the runners into the box. Argentina found another gear, another momentum, another belief. They built something over several years (together).” THREAT. His response to the growing Argentina threat? “We decided to play a back-five to have more width, (and) closer to the (Argentina) guys who cross. We did excellent after some minutes. We just became too passive, and Argentina found another gear.” SAKA. Why didn’t Bukayo Saka play against Argentina. “We decided for a more physical approach with Morgan Rogers. I felt like after the game against Norway, Morgan has something special in him. I'm glad he proved to us right with his assist (for Anthony Gordon’s goal).” DRAINED. Did England suffer a loss of intensity because their players were drained? “Even if we don't want to admit it, because it always feels like an excuse, I feel the game with 10 men in Mexico, the altitude, the travelling, we lost a complete night of sleep, and the game in the heat against Norway and in extra time cost us more than we maybe thought. The players gave everything physically every single match. If you see the intensity drop there must be a reason for it because the motivation was through the roof. We could not reach these kind of intensities.” BACKING. Tuchel enjoys FA backing, and he wants to stay on. “I can never change my thinking if I would like to carry on.” And so to the game with France. “There will be changes (to the line-up).” #FRAENG #ENG #FIFAWorldCup





















Thomas Tuchel: "I have no regrets over my decisions. I felt we became too passive, I felt the momentum switches, I tried to help my team. I trusted my experience, instinct and competitiveness. I take personal responsibility for these decisions. The decisions are made under stress. Is it easier if someone takes the blame, I take the blame. If you need someone to blame, I am the head coach."


all it takes is one big win











