I thought Telegraph reported Djed Spence as in. Oh Bukayo Saka I think may have taken a spot instead of one of the don't knows who haven't been announced yet.
England World Cup squad: Phil Foden, Cole Palmer and Harry Maguire to be left out - BBC Sport Aston Villa striker Ollie Watkins is set to be included BBC say Watkins in - so is that the 26?
Seems to me based on these selections that Tuchel made his mind up very early on a lot of these selections. His first squad last March is going to bare quite a lot of resemblance to the squad here it seems. Not too many lost favour from it, and plenty like Henderson, Quansah, Burn who were all wildcard calls at the time and haven't really done anything to earn it since have seemingly remained.
Is this it? Pickford, Henderson, Trafford James, Livramento, Guehi, Konsa, Stones, Burn, Quansah, O'Reilly, Lewis-Skelly Anderson, Rice, Mainoo, Henderson Saka, Madueke, Rashford, Gordon, Eze Bellingham, Rogers Kane, Watkins, Toney
Yeah, I think so. I think it's the same as what I posted a couple of pages back. Unless Tuchel is on a wind up. Crazy German.
Seems like it. You can make a good starting 11 out of it but there's a real lack of depth in certain areas. Notably the central midfield massively lacks athleticism if Mainoo and Henderson are the only depth options for the two deeper positions. Also not a genuine second left back which makes it quite baffling to leave Hall and Shaw out the squad. If he really wanted Lewis-Skelly surely dropping one of the 5 centre backs makes more sense. The attack also isn't going to have much off the bench either, though there is at least some diversity in options available thee.
We haven't got any particularly top class players anyway. Bellingham rice and kane so we could go the Argentina way who've won 3 major tournaments on the bounce without a single world class player and win as a team. Tuchel is a good tactical manager. We arent going to be able to compete with the likes of France or Spain talent wise so we'll have to dig in and force results
I mean that's 23, there's 26 and we haven't been told about the other 3 yet. I'll speculate a shock pick no one has said yet as one of the 3 travellers who won't play but will go. Max Dowman.
It's absolutely not a World Cup winning squad, we can be confident of that. Amongst everything you've mentioned there's a real lack of small space ability and guile in the middle of the pitch too. There's very limited creativity on the flanks (or anywhere else) outside of Saka and Reece James either. The overall burden on Saka is going to be huge.
As an Arsenal fan, I'm shocked Noni is in. The trouble comes in with TT leaving other would be impact subs like Bowen and Palmer. I totally agree. You can be ballsy and an idiot at the same time. This world cup will be wild for England. A lot of black call ups, I hope they won't get scapegoated.
If this is indeed the squad it does make our use of the friendlies last month look even more baffling in hindsight. Only 7 of the 19 players used from the Uruguay game have seemingly even made the squad! Just a complete waste of a game which is all the more baffling given how little time Tuchel has had with the squad and how the side has so little experience under him against decent sides. It's a continuation with a haphazard decision making that is very far from his reputation as a methodical, detail obsessed manager he was promised to be. I really hope there turns out to be method to the madness. I don't mind the squad being unapologetically his if it delivers at the tournament - its just difficult to see that happening and I can't really think of a time with England an unbalanced selection has surprised us all and came through.
Just remember this is turnip said that said people thought Foden was having a good season because of white privilege, just add to the ignore list.
I mean I could make decent arguments with all sides to be frank. It's a very open world cup. I'm not too fussed on Spain, France are a couple of midfield injuries away from being attack and defence with nothing else and Argentina are a middling outfit.
Lewis Skelly over Hall/Spence/Shaw, Henderson over Wharton/Garner/Scott and Burn over Maguire/Colwill/Chalobah are the three worst calls IMO. I had Toney in my squad but was expecting Calvert Lewin to get called over him. Happy that Watkins has been recalled. Taking just Rogers and Bellingham as the number 10s is so odd. Fair enough I don't think Foden deserved to go based on his previous England form but Palmer is a difference maker from the bench as is Gibbs White. Could have at least taken one of them.
You have to be trolling at this point right? The team with quite arguably the greatest player to ever play the sport didn't have a world class player?
Media scapegoating like in 2020. I'm African so the whole color thing, I couldn't help but think about.