- 8 hours ago
England are getting better and better under Thomas Tuchel. The German has a 100% record in competitive games at the helm, so what is different about this England side to previous years?Adam Clery breaks down the introduction of Elliot Anderson to the starting lineup, leaving out big names like Trent Alexander-Arnold and Phil Foden, and the new system Tuchel has implemented.
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00:00Hello everybody, welcome to the Adam Cleary Football Channel, and there's something very different about this England team.
00:09Brackets, complimentary.
00:10You won't see it properly until the summer, and when you do, you are going to shart your very kecks.
00:16But Thomas Tuchel is doing something with this England team that we have not seen before in my entire life.
00:24And as this was the XI that started against Latvia, what is it that he is doing?
00:29Why is he doing it? How come it's so good?
00:32Well, basically, it turns out that the first person to ever really understand English football and its problems is a
00:41German.
00:42So, let's have a look at that.
00:46Alright, so England can now add a win against Latvia to a 2025 where, yes, the Senegal-friendly was totally,
00:55totally shit.
00:56But otherwise, they've absolutely dominated their World Cup group, not conceded a single goal,
01:01and crucially, looked in way more control of games than they normally do.
01:06And I just need you to cast your minds back to this England XI at the European Championships.
01:11You remember it, even if you've tried to suppress it.
01:15They were great results.
01:16They got all the way at the final.
01:17But terrible performances.
01:20And aside from a very brief amount of time where Gareth Southgate, early in the rain, had you feeling like
01:25they were plucky underdogs,
01:27that's pretty much been the story of England at international level forever.
01:32Sometimes they get the win, but they almost never play well.
01:35Like, I am enough years old to remember Peter Crouch literally pulling some guy's dreadlocks
01:41so that England didn't start the 2006 World Cup with a 0-0 draw against Trinidad and Tobago.
01:49We have always, always had quality players, but we virtually never play like a quality team.
01:57And if you have ever had the misfortune of being stuck in a pub with me during an international tournament,
02:02you will have heard me say this a million times, right?
02:05But it's all to do with balance.
02:09We always absolutely load the England team with the biggest stars possible
02:13and just hope they'll be able to figure it out on the pitch from there.
02:17And yes, that does give you brilliant moments like Bellingham's equaliser against Slovakia,
02:23Saka's equaliser against Switzerland, Palmer's goal in the final.
02:26But they all tend to come in games where at some point, and for lots of it,
02:32you wish you were dead.
02:35And all right, yes, you can talk about the quality of opposition he's been up against thus far
02:39because it hasn't been amazing, right?
02:41But regardless, Thomas Tuchel has won every single competitive game since he took the job
02:472-0, and more importantly, England have been in control of every single one of those games.
02:55And it felt like they've been getting in more control as they've gone on.
02:58And that is as much to do with who Thomas Tuchel is not playing as it is to do with
03:05who he is playing.
03:07So right, there are two things here currently in the England side.
03:10I'm going to show you what the problem is first of all, and then show you what he's done to
03:14fix that.
03:14And it's not going to shock you, but the first one is basically just Elliot Anderson.
03:19His skill set is neither that of a bruising reducer nor a silky playmaker, but of a thoroughly modern, proper
03:27number six.
03:29He will happily take the ball in both space and pressure, can pass through a press, carry the ball upfield,
03:34and has the physicality to react quickly to turnovers in possession, both for and against his team.
03:41He is the fundamental base of any midfield that wants to be as functional as it is fantastic.
03:49I'm going to show you some stuff from the Serbia game here because he was unbelievable in that, right?
03:54Early on, England tried to play a clever pass around the corner, and just take a look here, right?
03:59From this distance, how much of Elliot Anderson's business is this really?
04:04Because I'd say hardly any.
04:06But when the ball is lost, and he realises how out of shape England are at the back, like these
04:12are the arrangement of the defenders,
04:13he makes it his business, bursts across to stop the Serbian midfielder turning in field, and playing forward.
04:21He just, like, hustles him back into traffic so England can get the ball back,
04:26which means Elliot Anderson has gone and regained possession here,
04:29but not with, like, some blockbuster tackle or something that makes for an impressive start,
04:33but just with really good reading of the game and a willingness to cover the ground required to cover for
04:41his teammates.
04:42Likewise, again, England are under pressure at the back.
04:44He confidently shows for the ball on the edge of his own box,
04:47and crucially, opts to turn into the pass rather than simply knocking it backwards
04:53and putting the responsibility back on his colleagues.
04:56But best of all here, and this is the kind of thing we mean when we talk about players who
05:00can set the tempo, right?
05:02He does not opt for the easy pass of knocking it out sideways here,
05:06but instead threads this needle through the midfield and through the press into Harry Kane.
05:12And it's a pretty simple decision, yes, but it's also, when you look at the situation, still quite a brave
05:18one.
05:19And it's decisions like that that quicken up what the entire team is doing,
05:24whereas going out to the wing would slow them down, hence setting the tempo.
05:29And don't get me wrong, none of this is particularly eye-catching unless you're specifically looking for it,
05:34but it's system play the likes of which England have very nearly never consistently had.
05:40Like, I think Declan Rice is an unbelievable footballer, right?
05:44He's got so many elite qualities to his game,
05:47but I'm also, like, quite deeply and traumatically scarred in, like, the brain and the deepest parts of my soul
05:55from having to watch England versus Denmark at the Euros,
05:58where they stuck Alexander-Arnold in central midfield with him.
06:02And he had to be the one to go and do all this work that Elliot Anderson now does.
06:07That really fucked me up.
06:08The one thing that is not his game is taking the ball in deep areas under a lot of pressure.
06:14He does not take up good spaces to receive it.
06:16He does not play his way out of trouble.
06:18It is the one major floor in his game, and Denmark pressured him over and over and over again,
06:25and England could not get out of their own third in any meaningful way having to go through him.
06:32Now, does this comparison make Elliot Anderson a better footballer than Declan Rice?
06:37No, of course it doesn't.
06:39Not even close, in my opinion.
06:41But does it make England a more balanced team when you put the former in the XI
06:47so that the latter can focus on the stuff he's really good at?
06:52Yes, obviously.
06:53This is what the video's about.
06:54In the games Anderson has started for England, he has had more than 90 touches in each of them.
06:59He had 127 against Andorra, and away in Serbia, he won the most duels of any player on the pitch.
07:07And I know Serbia aren't great at the minute, but Serbia away is not a kickabout with your mates.
07:13It's not the League Cup second round.
07:16It's a genuinely terrifying place to go and play football,
07:19especially if you're making one of your first appearances for your national side,
07:24and especially, especially if your entire reason for being there
07:27is to be receiving the ball under pressure on the edge of your own box.
07:31But you watched him in that game, and his passing was excellent.
07:34His pressing was excellent.
07:36He was asserting himself in both boxes, both in and out of possession.
07:41He was simultaneously England's orchestrator and its organ donor.
07:46He was their poet and their paramedic.
07:52That'll do.
07:53And you want to see something that made my heart sing with joy, right?
07:56The Wales game, right at the start, high press.
07:59Bellamy's got them doing this really, really well.
08:02Rice and Anderson are on the edge of the box,
08:04and Anderson goes, it's fine.
08:07Oh, mate, look, don't worry about any of this, right?
08:09I know this isn't your thing.
08:10Just you push on, you move up, you go be where you want to go be.
08:14I'll just take care of this.
08:16And he does take care of this.
08:17He gets in there.
08:18He takes the ball under pressure, and England are away up the field.
08:21Later on in that half, right, this was about as aggressive as Wales got off the ball.
08:26You can see there's six players here, all trying to either close it down or cut off a passing option.
08:31And Anderson screams for the ball off a teammate three separate times,
08:36because he knows he can get them out of this situation without someone just having to hump it long and
08:42lose it.
08:42He's constantly offering an option before he finally drops between the two attackers,
08:46takes the central ball from Pickford on the turn, which kills the press entirely,
08:50and then carries them all the way to the halfway line.
08:53And barring some kind of major injury or, I don't know, Thomas Tuchel getting kicked in the head by a
08:59horse.
08:59I was kicked in the head by a horse.
09:02Or something, he will be on the plane.
09:05And based on these performances, he should also be, my opinion, on the grass.
09:10But if, my friends, you could just recall, like six or seven minutes ago,
09:14I did say that part of this was the players who are on the grass,
09:18but the other part is the players who are not.
09:21This run of England performances, where they have finally asserted the sort of control they should in games,
09:27has taken part without a great many of its quote-unquote stars.
09:34Of this seven-game run, Jude Bellingham has only started three matches.
09:38Phil Foden has only started one.
09:40Cole Palmer has only started one.
09:41And Trent Alexander-Arnold has played a grand total of 25 minutes.
09:46Well, but just hang on a second there.
09:48I know what you're going to say.
09:48It's the injuries, Adam.
09:50These players have been injured.
09:51That's why they've not been playing.
09:53And that's not wrong, necessarily.
09:55But let's just take a little step back, a little deep breath.
09:58Let's lay a few things out.
10:00Jude Bellingham could absolutely have been called into this squad, but he wasn't.
10:04Tuchel said he was very happy to go with the squad that played so well last time.
10:08And fair enough.
10:10Foden and Alexander-Arnold, likewise, have been publicly dropped by him.
10:15Foden was for this camp, and Trent was in the last one.
10:18And they are undeniably two of England's most talented footballers.
10:23But I don't think either of them could make a strong argument to say that they have reliably delivered when
10:29they've started for their country.
10:30They've never let anybody down, sure.
10:33But have they got a stronger case than anybody else in this team?
10:36I don't think so.
10:37And Cole Palmer is a trickier proposition, like he has genuinely only missed out when he's been injured.
10:44But you look back across the last 12 months of football for England, he's only played 65 minutes in that
10:50time.
10:50So it's hard to argue he is an integral part of anything that's happened.
10:54But yet, his absence in this side, along with dropping Bellingham, along with dropping Foden,
10:59means that we have now mostly been using Morgan Rodgers and Anthony Gordon.
11:04These are two players who love running with the ball, carrying it up the field, going beyond the centre forward,
11:11getting in behind the defence, and using that running to create chances.
11:15And that, coincidentally, is just exactly the kind of player Harry Kane's having so much fun playing with at Bayern
11:24Munich.
11:24Because that style of play really suits how much he just loves to drop away from the defenders and get
11:31on the ball.
11:32And not to keep banging on about the European Championships.
11:35I'm aware I may have some unresolved trauma there.
11:38I'll get to it, though.
11:39Don't worry.
11:40If we look at his heat map from the entire tournament, you can see he was spending way more time
11:45getting involved with the midfield
11:47than he was in and around the box.
11:49And, obviously, if he's going to spend that much time doing that,
11:52then you need to have other players in the side who will revel in getting into that space he is
11:58creating for them.
11:59Whether it's to have a go themselves or create a chance for him as he arrives late.
12:04That's how he works as a centre forward.
12:06And Anthony Gordon, he's really direct.
12:08He loves doing that.
12:09Morgan Rodgers is really direct.
12:11He loves doing that.
12:13But Cole Palmer and Phil Foden and players like them don't.
12:17They want the ball into feet.
12:19They want to be getting it in those areas.
12:21They want to be playing with centre forwards like Erling Haaland, like Nicholas Jackson,
12:25who do the running themselves to pull defenders out of the way and make the space here for them.
12:31It's a clash of styles.
12:32And with that space, they can get turned.
12:35They can create things.
12:36They can find the players ahead of them.
12:38They can have nice little rotations.
12:39But what Harry Kane really wants is not that.
12:43He wants runners.
12:45And if Foden and Palmer are out of the side, he's got runners.
12:49And it is this idea of not having the best possible England 11,
12:52but having the most balanced possible England 11,
12:55which is what Tuchel is trying to do.
12:57You look at that sack of goal.
12:59Like, Esri Concer is, in your mind, what?
13:02England's seventh or eighth choice right back right now?
13:06In this situation here, he makes an underlapping run where he will never be getting that ball,
13:12but clears out the space required for Saka to cut in and shoot by occupying these defenders.
13:18Trent Alexander-Arnold and Rhys James are infinitely better right backs than Esri Concer,
13:23but neither of them would have done that in that situation.
13:26They would have been wanting to be in their favoured positions so they could get the ball,
13:30so they could be the ones to affect the game.
13:32But Concer instead, well, he knows to just leave those things to Saka,
13:36so he goes and helps him out by making a sacrificial move.
13:40And Archie, I know what you like, by the way.
13:42If you cut in me saying sacrificial move with that Harry Potter clip where he's like,
13:48are you going to take my... he's going to sacrifice himself, or however it goes, right?
13:53I'm going to take something that you love.
13:57I'm going to boil it.
13:58But anyway, though, Morgan Rodgers, who I should probably do like an entire video on
14:02of like England's Morgan Rodgers versus Aston Villa's Morgan Rodgers,
14:05because Aston Villa's Morgan Rodgers is having an absolutely minging season,
14:08and England's Morgan Rodgers is having the most fun I've ever seen anyone have in their lives.
14:14That's a good thing.
14:15He is absolutely perfect for what this England system needs.
14:19Both Saka and Gordon benefit from having him in the middle.
14:22Both the midfielders love having him drop in and carry the ball for them.
14:25Harry Kane benefits loads from having him go beyond them.
14:28I'm already, already anxious about the discourse that is going to surround this man
14:34when he goes to the World Cup, and one of these three gentlemen do not.
14:41I will be staying off the internet that day.
14:44So yes, again, this was the England XI against Latvia,
14:47and you could argue it is as bad an England XI as we have had in years.
14:52In fact, you could also argue that you could make an entire XI full of players
14:56who, for one reason or another, missed out on this camp,
14:59and that is a much, much better side.
15:02But if you were to do that, right,
15:05then I would argue that this obsession with packing the England side
15:10full of as many exciting young stars as you possibly can
15:13at the expense of more reliable performers
15:17who will bring better balance to the manager system
15:20has been the problem with England at international level for decades.
15:26And Thomas Tuchel, of all people, might be the first manager
15:29to really have a grasp of that problem
15:32and want to do something about it.
15:35Like, he's not here for a long time.
15:36He's got a very short contract.
15:37It's pretty much just the World Cup.
15:39He does not care if he is popular.
15:42He does not care if he falls out with big players.
15:45He will disregard whoever he wants
15:47if they're not going to do what he needs them to do,
15:51no matter how good they might be on EAFC 26.
15:55And so far, they're playing loads better as a result of this idea.
16:01Hmm.
16:02Make you think.
16:03So, yes, there you go.
16:04That's why England on a team sheet
16:06appeared to be getting, like, steadily worse.
16:08But when you actually watch them,
16:09they're getting better and better.
16:11That's nice.
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