England are about to attempt the hardest thing in international football: scoring against Spain. Luis de la Fuente’s side conceded a single goal across eight matches on their way to winning the World Cup, allowing their opponents a total of 2.37 expected goals across the tournament — a mere 0.30 per 90 minutes.
Thomas Tuchel has recognised the scale of the task, saying he hoped his team could “became for 10 minutes more like Spain” and dominate possession when the heat was on. He also offered what may prove the more useful thought in the same press conference, describing how English players and supporters prefer chaos. “There is no heritage of: ‘Oh, let’s control around the middle line. Let’s do a deep buildup and then bring them out’,” he said. “It’s just like: ‘Come on. Let’s kick the ball into the opponent’s box and fight with them’.” Nobody out-footballs Spain, so alternate methods are required.
The two defeats Spain have suffered under de la Fuente both came in Britain, and both were built on deliveries from wide areas. Scotland beat them 2-0 in Euros qualifying at Hampden Park in March 2023, with Scott McTominay scoring twice; his second came after David García failed to clear a Kieran Tierney cross. Rodri’s verdict afterwards was blunt: “For me, this is not football.” Twelve months later Colombia won 1-0 in a friendly at the London Stadium, Luis Díaz crossing for Daniel Muñoz to score.
The chances Spain allow confirm the pattern. The average shot is worth 0.1 expected goals, and across 750 minutes at the World Cup Spain conceded only six chances that Opta rated above that mark; lower the threshold to 0.07 and the figure rises to just ten. The eight teams they faced needed a collective average of 75 minutes to manufacture a single opportunity with better than a one-in-14 chance of becoming a goal.
Charles De Ketelaere’s goal for Belgium was the only one Spain conceded, and it was set up by a Timothy Castagne cross. It was one of four Opta-defined big chances Spain allowed at the tournament, all of them headers and all created by deliveries from wide areas. Giuliano Simeone’s chance in the 121st minute of the final — which would have sent the match to penalties had he fired under the crossbar rather than over it — originated from a corner, as did the cross that presented Cape Verde’s Diney Borges with a 91st-minute opportunity in Spain’s opening game. Cristiano Ronaldo’s relatively high-value effort in the last-16 Iberian derby came after a cross to the back post was headed back to him in the six-yard box, a better chance than anything France produced in the semi-final, where their best attempt was rated at 0.06 expected goals and came from a corner. Cape Verde, Saudi Arabia and Uruguay, so starved were they of opportunities, were reduced to trying to score from inside their own halves.
There is a structural reason crossing may be the most viable route through. Pau Cubarsí’s Barcelona conceded the second fewest crosses per game of the 96 clubs in Europe’s big five leagues last season, while Athletic Bilbao — home to Unai Simón and Aymeric Laporte, the rest of Spain’s first-choice goalkeeper and centre-back combination — were joint-ninth. Cubarsí and Laporte each contested fewer than four aerial duels per 90 minutes, a figure many Premier League centre-backs exceed in duels won alone. Balls in the air are simply a much bigger part of the game in England.
Crossing is widely dismissed as inefficient and old-school, leaning heavily on English football stereotypes. But the question here is not how to build a playing philosophy for the future; it is how to score once against the meanest defence in the game. If Trent Alexander-Arnold is keen to get back into Tuchel’s good books, a trademark cross onto the head of Harry Kane would be a strong starting point. There may be no other way for him, or for England, to prosper against the world champions.