Just when we all thought we had seen the last of Gareth Southgate, this performance under Thomas Tuchel felt like he had come back to haunt this England team.
The final score read England 0 Ghana 0 and a lot to reflect on.
Not a lot of excitement, goals or entertainment to look back on though in this second group match.
The question is: A one-off for this new England team, or will Scooby Doo now unmask Thomas Tuchel and reveal Gareth Southgate?
We were back to an ultra cautious England team seemingly too scared to try and do anything that carried any remote chance of risk. So basically, no running forward into space that opened up, no taking on an opposition player instead endless negative passing, sideways and backwards.
The true nature though of not taking any risks in terms of trying to score goals, is that you create greater risk in reality for your team. In that if you don’t create many chances, don’t score any goals, then when the opposition inevitably get even a few decent situations at the other end, disaster can strike. Which is what almost happened and in reality, should have happened.
Jordan Pickford didn’t make a single save all match but he almost certainly should have been sent off when recklessly charging out of his box and taking out their player, a very generous refereeing decision giving Pickford the free-kick instead.
Konsa attempted a ridiculous recovery tackle in the penalty area and launched himself two footed as the Ghana player looked set to score, somehow the referee or VAR not seeing that as a penalty.
Ghana were ultra negative but then you need even more players to take responsibility, take attacking initiative. Instead, everybody was just too scared to try anything, with very rare exceptions.
With a packed defence you need the wingers to make the pitch as big as possible but instead we have the usual thing of inverted wingers invariably bringing the ball inside into crowded areas, rather than doing the more difficult BUT threatening thing if you get it right, of going on the outside and getting crosses in. The decent moments that England did have, almost all of them (few as they were!) came from the small number of times England went around the outside.
When there is so little created in open play it is vital that crossing the ball, especially on set-pieces, yet England’s delivery was shocking nearly every time.
When looking to build from the back, Guehi and Konsa were shocking, terrified to try and do anything apart from endless five yard passes mostly between themselves. Reece James yet again proved how vastly overrated he is, weak in defence and so poor when England tried to get forward. Djed Spence did okay on the other side and at least tried to help make things happen.
Anthony Gordon contributed next to nothing, Madueke almost as bad. Anderson very limited for me and contributed nothing to England trying to break the opposition down. Bellingham I thought gave it everything and Rice the same, but their teammates not up their levels and as a result Harry Kane starved of service.
Substitute O’Reilly should have scored but didn’t make proper connection and his shoulder effort hit the bar. The one huge chance falling to Harry Kane who snatched at it and lashed over the bar when he absolutely should have scored. This is what happens though when so little is created over the entire match, one or two big chances become too important.
Rashford has probably played his way into the team instead of Gordon as he did okay off the bench, whilst Morgan Rogers also did well when coming on. I wonder if there is any way of accommodating both Bellingham and Rogers in the same team against Panama on Saturday?
The stats showed England with 79% possession, 19 v 2 on shots, 9 v 2 on corners, 633 v 172 on completed passes. An England passing accuracy of 93%…but that is a false stat really when almost all of them are passes that carry zero risk and are usually within five or ten yards.
Maybe the big reassuring thing was Thomas Tuchel. The sight of him frequently losing it on the sideline as England played it far too safe far too many times. Clearly this wasn’t a Gareth Southgate plan to bore us all to death, more a case of England players too timid and lacking the courage to carry out Tuchel’s intentions. Maybe a case of too many England players worried by the thought of the two goals conceded against Croatia in the opening 4-2 victory.
However, this England team doesn’t have as its big strength defensive class, instead it needs to gamble on the undoubted quality that does exist in the team/squad when going on the attack.
England are in effect guaranteed progress with now four points from two games BUT they do need to regain that aggressive attacking intent on Saturday to restore confidence and belief when they take on Panama. Or else once they hit the knockout stages we could see the previous Southgate cautious negative tactical approach lead to a tame exit once England face a decent opposition, or even worse, exit to a very limited opponent such as a Ghana type side.
Final score: England 0 Ghana 0
England team v Ghana:
Pickford; James, Guehi, Konsa, Spence; Anderson, Rice; Madueke, Bellingham, Gordon; Kane
The 2026 World Cup games schedule for Group L:
Wednesday 17 June
Croatia 2 England 4
Thursday 18 June
Ghana 1 Panama 0
Tuesday 23 June
Ghana 0 England 0
Wednesday 24 June
Croatia 1 Panama 0
Saturday 27 June
Panama v England 10pm ITV1
Ghana v Croatia 10am ITV4