Thomas Tuchel has completed his first mission as England’s new senior men’s head coach — emerging unscathed from his first press conference.
The former Bayern Munich and Chelsea manager answered questions alongside the Football Association’s chief executive officer Mark Bullingham, who helped lead the process to appoint him, at Wembley on Wednesday.
But what did we learn?
The FA’s 10 ‘interviews’
Bullingham: “We interviewed approximately 10 people and we did interview some English candidates. You wouldn’t expect me to divulge any details… We ran a really clear process. We spoke to approximately 10 throughout the process. Clearly some were more up for the role than others. We were absolutely delighted to end up with Thomas and we believe he gives us the best chance of winning the World Cup. We believe the best candidate got the job.”
The Athletic has already reported that Pep Guardiola was the FA’s first choice for the England job. While Bullingham did not want to give too much away about the process that has been run over the last few months — although his admission that not everyone spoken to was keen to be considered was telling — Tuchel was more willing to talk about his own discussions with Bullingham and John McDermott which led to this point.
But Bullingham did claim that the FA had spoken to “approximately 10” managers since Southgate’s resignation. This may come as a surprise to some people — not least some of the candidates themselves — but it may depend on your definition of the word ‘interview’, and whether every conversation with a possible candidate the FA reached out to counts as one. It is possible that some of these ‘interviews’ may, in fact, have been short, informal chats simply to gauge interest.
The German question…
Tuchel: “I am sorry to have a German passport but I can just tell them and maybe the supporters can feel my passion for the English Premier League, my passion for the country, how I love to live and work here. How my memories are of the highest level and they played a huge role and hopefully I can convince people and show them and prove to them that I am proud to be English manager.”
It was only a few minutes into Tuchel’s first public comments as (incoming) England manager that he made his first serious comments defending the fact that he is a German managing the England team.
Tuchel’s argument, which he made with real passion, is that he has a genuine attachment to English football, especially from his time managing Chelsea. This is in sync with comments he made earlier this year to ESPN when he said he felt more “appreciated” in England than his native country.
When the FA first advertised for this job in July, they said that being English was not a criterion, but that the successful candidate must have experience of English football, as well a record of “successfully identifying, managing and developing English qualified players”. Tuchel can certainly lean on that, in a way that Fabio Capello could not when he was appointed to this job in 2007.
… and the national anthem
Tuchel: “I understood from Mark that it’s a personal decision if you sing it and there were managers who sang it and others who didn’t. I have not made my decision yet. The English anthem is very moving. I experienced it several times here at Wembley, even out with the players at the FA Cup final. I will always show my respect to my new role, to the country and of course to a very moving anthem. But as this is a new subject I will take a bit of time for this decision.”
Tuchel will have been well aware of the controversy last month over Lee Carsley not singing the national anthem, a debate that dominated his first game in interim charge against the Republic of Ireland in Dublin. Tuchel gave a very thorough and respectful answer when asked about the subject: he looked well prepared and almost smiled as he delivered it.
Regardless of whether Tuchel ends up singing the national anthem or not, he is clearly very determined to get the politics and the optics right on the non-footballing matters.
His 18-month contract
Tuchel: “It’s 18 months and then we agreed to sit together and we see. I have good experience with 18 months, personally. Unfortunately, also sometimes, I’m working on my long-term game. You never know. The point was in this particular case it wasn’t important for me to have a frame around it because it’s a little bit of a step into the unknown for me… It’s a good timeframe because it will help us to focus… on the qualification and the World Cup.”
The fact that Tuchel has only signed an 18-month contract as England manager — as revealed by The Athletic on Tuesday night — will inevitably lead to questions about the tight turnaround.
He will only have six international camps with the players before the next World Cup, not much time to instil a new style of play, or for him to get used to the demands of international rather than club management. But Tuchel managed to turn this into a positive, making a joke about his short spells in charge of clubs which have defined his recent career.
Tuchel did 14 months at Bayern, 20 months at Chelsea, two and a half years at PSG and two years at Dortmund. He has not been able to build for the long term in his club jobs since his five years at Mainz — which ended more than 10 years ago — so the short spell at England will not be a problem for him.
Kane and the captaincy
Tuchel: “I did not speak to Harry… I haven’t done it yet. It’s too early to answer these kinds of questions. You know how highly I think of Harry and how much I fought to bring him to Bayern Munich. He is already on his way to being a legend in English football. But now I think it is very important to give the respect to Lee (Carsley) and have the camp in November and take his decisions free of me interfering.”
There will be plenty of talk about Kane’s role over the next two years. He is England’s captain and leading all-time goalscorer but struggled at the Euros and was substituted with England needing a goal in the quarter-final, semi-final and final in Germany.
How exactly to manage the 31-year-old will be a big question facing Tuchel when he starts work. Tuchel, of course, has a great relationship with Kane, pushing for Bayern to sign him in 2023 and then coaching him as he scored 44 goals in his first season for Germany. But he was clear that he did not specifically reach out with Kane to speak to him before the news broke of his taking the England job, and offered no specific guarantees about his role in the new-look England team.
The England ‘DNA’
Tuchel: We will build on it [Southgate’s culture]. I think Gareth and the FA did a fantastic job in terms of stability and consistency. Look at the results in the last tournaments: quarter-final, semi-final and two finals in the last four tournaments. It’s outstanding. The under-21s won titles, the young teams are in the competition to win titles, the women’s team won titles so we are there and the federation is there.”
The FA has been criticised for the big change in strategy in abandoning eight years of careful development under Southgate and then going for the big-name signing in Tuchel. People are worried that the culture Southgate built, and which players and fans all bought into, will start to erode if the England team loses that identity.
Tuchel gave a very respectful answer on Southgate’s culture, saying that he wants to build on it, honouring the hard work of Southgate over the last eight years, and saying that the work the FA have done behind the scenes was even a big reason he took the job.
Turning England into winners
Tuchel: The group of players proved that they are there. The consistency of quarter-final, semi-final, finals is impressive. And it shows that we have players who compete in the strongest league in the world. And we fully trust that this is the moment to install maybe also from club football patterns, behaviours, principles that can maybe help to push the team over the line… But most important is, even if we speak out now very openly about what the target is, about the second star … we have to prove ourselves all the time.”
Tuchel gave the first sense of how he sees his job as England manager here. He knows that Southgate has left him a brilliant foundation, after four periods of sustained competitiveness and coming close to winning a major trophy. But England have not quite been able to get over the line.
Tuchel’s job is to take England that final step. And he has something that Southgate does not have: experience at the top end of the European club game. He hopes that those “patterns, behaviours, principles” that he can instil in the players from his time managing Europe’s top clubs will help the England team to take that final step.
