Thomas Tuchel believes England were a danger to themselves on the ball during their 3-2 defeat to Spain. The Three Lions made several crucial mistakes in their loss to the reigning world and European champions on Saturday and were made to pay with goals from Lamine Yamal, Alex Baena and Mikel Oyarzabal. Having gone the whole of the World Cup qualifying campaign without conceding, Tuchel's side have now let in nine from their last three internationals against Argentina, France and Spain.
Despite showing frailties against elite opposition, Tuchel does not think England's issue lies with their defensive set-up and instead insists that their mistakes have come from causing their own issues in possession. "It's not a concern yet," Tuchel said ahead of England's second Nations League game against Czech Republic on Tuesday. "I felt that in terms of organised defending, block defending and active defending, we were at a higher level than in many other matches.
Follow Czech Republic vs England with our live match blog on the Sky Sports website and App on Tuesday; kick-off 7.45pm. "If you want to look at it in isolation on how we did within the structure and in the units of the sides, I was quite happy and I think it was a step ahead. "We suffered clearly from individual mistakes when we had the ball, especially in the deep build-up, so that is of course something we cannot repeat.
"Strangely enough, when we had the ball, we were the biggest danger to ourselves around the box because we just had too many individual mistakes. Purely in defending, I have no concerns and I trust that we can do it." We'll be running a Q&A with Sky Sports News England reporter Rob Dorsett on Tuesday morning. Head to the Sky Sports website or App and get your Three Lions question in and Rob will answer the best of them!
Tuchel's comments come off the back of widespread criticism of his tactics during England's World Cup semi-final defeat to Argentina, where he opted to defend a one-goal lead rather than looking to extend their advantage. The German responded by hitting out at the 'DNA' of English players. "I think ball possession plays a crucial role; it's maybe not in our DNA like it is in Spanish DNA or in Argentinian-Brazilian DNA, to take the ball and control the game with the ball," he said following their exit.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player It raised scrutiny over England's footballing identity, but Tuchel believed his players showcased exactly that in the defeat to Luis de la Fuente's side at Wembley. "I think there was a lot of discussion about this before [the Spain game]," Tuchel stated. "I think we showed our style and we showed our courage.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
