Thomas Tuchel singles out two England players for criticism after debut win | Football

Thomas Tuchel believes Phil Foden and Marcus Rashford were not ‘aggressive’ enough in attacking areas during England’s 2-0 win against Albania on Friday night.

England got off to a winning start in Tuchel’s first game in charge as goals from Myles Lewis-Skelly and Harry Kane sealed a win for the Three Lions in their first 2026 World Cup qualifier.

Both Foden and Rashford failed to register a shot on target at Wembley and were replaced by Anthony Gordon and Jarrod Bowen with 16 minutes remaining.

And Tuchel admits he expected to see more from individuality from Foden and Rashford in attacking areas.

‘I think both of our wingers who started were not as impactful as they normally can be as they are in club football,’ Tuchel said.

‘At the moment, I’m not sure why we struggled to bring the ball quicker to them, to bring the ball in a more open position to them, I’m not sure why it took us so long.

‘I think we lacked a little bit of runs off the ball, a bit too much passing and not enough dribbling, not enough carrying and driving with the ball, and not aggressive enough towards goal.

‘They trained very well, they were decisive in training, that’s why I also think they deserved [to start], they were very good in the last weeks with their clubs.

‘We will keep on encouraging them and make a structure for them to show their potential.’

In a separate interview with ITV, Tuchel added: ‘We hope for more impact in these positions, we tried with Anthony [Gordon] and Jarrod Bowen.

‘I hope for a little bit more impact, more dribbling, less passes, more dribbling and more aggressive runs towards the box.

‘I think this was in general missing, I think all the chances came from the diagonal runs behind the lines, Jude had some good runs in the first half, Myles scored from it, Kyle Walker had one where we had a big chance to score the second.

‘This was a bit missing, they were not as decisive as they can be.’

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