Ian Wright says Thomas Tuchel is trying to impart as much love as possible on his England players after watching the Three Lions in their warm-up camp ahead of the win over Croatia. England ran out 4-2 winners over their fellow Europeans, with Luka Modric’s side tipped to be their fiercest competitors in Group L.
However, England blew them away in the second half after goals from Jude Bellingham and Marcus Rashford. Harry Kane’s first-half brace was cancelled out by Martin Baturina’s brilliant strike and Petar Musa’s fine finish, with assistant coach Anthony Barry slamming a ‘complicated and confusing’ first-half display.
Captain Kane praised Tuchel’s half-time message, which drew a brilliant response from the Three Lions. Wright heaped praise on the German head coach for building such camaraderie in a short space of time after going behind the scenes at their training camp earlier this month.
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Speaking to ITV, Wright revealed: “What I saw with the time that I spent with them, they seemed very together. Everybody seemed very jolly, very calm, very cool about everything.
“When you see Thomas Tuchel going into different groups and talking to them, it’s not like people are uncomfortable with him. Everything was quite tactile and quite nice.
“Even the way he is with Harry Kane, how he loves people. I think because he’s been the club manager and not the international manager and doesn’t get them as often.
“I think he’s trying to impart as much love and joy that he can simply because he doesn’t get them long enough.”
View 2 ImagesThomas Tuchel, manager of England(Image: Alex Pantling – FIFA/FIFA via Getty Images)
Tuchel hailed the response from his players in the dressing room after his half-time chat and said: “I think the reaction was excellent, the effort was enormous because we were not very clean when we won balls.
“With the second and first touch after a ball win, we were not clean enough We learn a lot from these moments. We are exhausted but don’t get me wrong, I loved exhausted players in the dressing room.
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“I think we needed it against a strong opponent. It’s pressure, it’s the first game of the tournament. We got our win, so today it’s only positives and the day after tomorrow we fix the rest.”
The Three Lions top the group after the win over Croatia and are back in action on Tuesday night when they take on Ghana in Boston, who defeated Panama 1-0 in the early hours of Thursday morning.
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