Saturday’s Nations League meeting with Spain will arrive 73 days after the pain and shame of Atlanta, where England surrendered a winning position in a World Cup semi-final against Argentina. Having decided to sit on their lead, England then watched Enzo Fernández summon the ghost of Andy Möller at Euro 96 with his celebration, before Lautaro Martínez headed home unmarked. Allowing Lionel Messi the freedom of the inside-right channel had turned out to be a critical oversight. Englishmen across the globe slumped; Croydon BoxPark fell deathly silent.
The Nations League quadruple-header is a soft re-entry to international football, but facing the world champions is a severe test of credentials. Any Football Association bloviation about a best performance since 1966 in winning a third-place playoff that resembled a hungover Soccer Aid — France not making a tackle in the first half — has done little to brush away the disappointment.
Plenty of blame is there to be shared around, and Thomas Tuchel has been more than happy to share it. His explanation for the battening down of the hatches has been a case of “it’s not me, it’s you”. The Tuchel version of events is that shovelling on Dan Burn with nine minutes to play was a reaction to players having already decided unilaterally to bunch up in front of Jordan Pickford and follow in the tradition of failures past. He has said 99% of fans do not ask him about his Atlanta substitutions. To follow his narrative, there is some corner of a foreign field that is for ever an England player: exhausted, unable to complete a pass, gassing out.
It is a compelling argument, with plenty of cases to back it up — though it might reasonably be asked whether stopping it happening was Tuchel’s job in the first place. Analysis this week suggested the gassing out followed Tuchel asking his players to run too hard in the group stage. A squad mostly coming off hard seasons in the grasp and grapple of the Premier League could not replicate such energy in the knockouts, their rearguard efforts against Mexico and Norway proving portentous preludes to facing Argentina.
Spain, meanwhile, arrive under Luis de la Fuente after winning back-to-back major tournaments, having already beaten England in the Euro 2024 final. Spanish success in the 21st century has often sent root-and-branch reformers asking whether England can learn lessons, but the players’ own assessment is rather less optimistic.
“We don’t have that strength like the Spanish, where we control games like they do,” said Anthony Gordon, now playing in Spain, for whom his goal in Atlanta is bittersweet. His solution is to play to England’s strengths, which he defines as playing physical, direct football and on the counterattack. It sounds familiar.
With Tuchel unrepentant, England ready themselves for Euro 2028 set for more of the same, starting on Saturday against Spain.
Elsewhere in the Nations League on Thursday, João Félix’s strike for Portugal was enough to sink Wales 1-0, while Cody Gakpo’s late equaliser for the Netherlands denied Jürgen Klopp a winning start as Germany boss. Israel’s forward Saied Abu Farchi was sent off as a result of his goal celebration in his side’s 3-1 defeat to Austria.