No regrets, Herr Tuchel? Really? Try telling that to the English patriots who blew their life’s savings on the great World Cup delusion. Such needless sacrifice.
No regrets? Try telling that to the millions who watched aghast back home as a foreign manager parked that shameful bus of fear in that same cowering cul-de-sac as England’s own Gareth Southgate. Such cruel irony.
No regrets? Try telling that, worst of all, to the players he betrayed by his abandonment of ambition with the most suicidal substitutions since Alf Ramsey took off Bobby Charlton when he had the Germans on their knees in a World Cup quarter-final half a century ago. Such is the morphing of the decades into one unending blur of dejection.
No regrets? The reality was written on the face of Harry Kane as our imported Doubting Thomas railed at the team during the last of those accursed dehydration breaks before Argentina blew them out of the water. Just as by Southgate’s timid trepidation, so the dressing room was lost to Tuchel’s narcissistic tyranny. The eyes of England’s captain glazed over as he turned his head away from what proved to be the last of Tuchel’s maniacal rants.
The die of a doomed strategy was cast – stonewalling defenders sent on to replace creative talents who might have built on that one-goal lead. Instead of going for final glory they were left hanging on for dear life, like bats blinded by sunlight.
Inviting General Messi and his troops to storm those hastily erected ramparts was akin to offering your unprotected chin for Mike Tyson to prove his punching power. The result was the same. A knock-out from which it will take England years to recover.
Thomas Tuchel said he had ‘no regrets’ over the way England feebly exited the World Cup
Tuchel tries in vain to rally his troops during the semi-final defeat to Argentina
Even longer if Tuchel remains in command. Perhaps never, since Kane cannot have four years left in him and the bulk of these players, for all that they were let down by their boss this fateful heading-south night in Georgia, are not all they’ve been cracked up to be.
Did nobody else see this coming? Really? Not the sycophants who drooled over Bellingham the bellicose, Rice the over-rated, Rogers the unready, Anderson the one-dimensional, Pickford the agitated and Rashford the unreliable.
Worst, all the swooning converts to Tuchel the self-obsessed. This is one articulate gentleman who can talk the birds out of the trees. Not least when coyly confessing to minor mistakes. Most cleverly when clouding more serious errors behind a smoke screen of football scientifics.
Let us spell this out for him. He never seemed to know what his best team was. As he proved in his bizarre selection for this ill-fated semi-final. His all-win record in the European qualifiers for World Cup 2026 was built on a group so feeble that my long-gone Sunday morning team might have made it to Kansas. The warm-up to 2026 was pockmarked with worrying friendlies. The opening phase of 2026 was a shoo-in, not the ‘severe test’ as he advertised. Even then they barely got away with rehearsing that backs-to-the-wall routine against Ghana.
As Argentina walked over England’s welcome mat – in another of their infuriating displays of recovery power – one commentator observed: ‘At least we will always have the Azteca.’
Let us put that into perspective. Mexico might as easily have won a match which was a dramatic thriller and a tribute to English fortitude, in isolation. Not a true World Cup epic. When it came to Norway, Tuchel did get something right when he said: ‘This was a great result but not an elite level football match.’
The bitter truth is that his England did not play really well in any of their games in this tournament. Whether that included playing to less than their potential only the next Euros will tell us. Although there are grounds for suspecting that this potential is significantly lower than the cheerleaders would have had us believe. Too many egos are grossly inflated by untold wealth and spurious celebrity.
Not that this excuses Tuchel. There can be no forgiving leaving so much talent at home in favour of unproven, inexperienced wannabes. Least of all Trent Alexander-Arnold when right-back remained the most troubling of England’s problems from over-hyped start to catastrophic finish.
He never seemed to know what his best team was. As he proved in his bizarre selection for this ill-fated semi-final
There can be no forgiving leaving Trent Alexander-Arnold at home when right-back remained the most troubling of England’s problems
Nor for picking a team come the crunch which had not played together before, was awkwardly unbalanced by players out of position. Not when he gave up 78 per cent of ball-possession between Gordon’s goal and Argentina’s equaliser. Not when that goal was England’s solitary shot on target all night long.
And no, by the way, a semi-final is not good enough. Not when England had one foot in a New York Sunday final before our German manager sounded a retreat to the trenches. Not when he gave away all the good work he had put into calming Bellingham by confusing him to such an extent that he arrived too late when it came to blocking the long shot which wiped out England’s lead.
No regrets? Only the FA seem convinced by that sentiment. But then they have to live with renewing Tuchel’s contract through to the Euros in 2028 before he made a mug of himself and a mess of England’s football. My advice to those administrators: Cut your losses.
Cry God for England, Harry and St George is clearly not in the lexicon of the German manager who could not bring himself to pay lip service to his team’s national anthem.
Messi, like Kane, will be lost to us all come the 2030 World Cup. Argentina’s average age was higher but their future can be built on a history of winning and a never-say-die tradition.
For England, Paradise is still lost. Can it be reclaimed from the sinking sands of 60 years in a World Cup desert? Not with this manager. For Doubting Thomas, it is time to Tuch and go.
