Thomas Tuchel hopes England can sharpen up after they produced what he described as a “not very clean” performance in their World Cup opener.
The Three Lions made a winning start to the tournament as they put four goals past Croatia, with Harry Kane at the double in the first half before Jude Bellingham and Marcus Rashford put the tie to bed in the second half. But Tuchel, ever a perfectionist, highlighted one key area of improvement on which he will focus before facing Ghana next week.
He took particular issue with a sloppy first-half performance, telling ITV Sport: “The first half was a bit complicated for us. It was a bit nervy. The decisions we took, we chose to go safe and go backwards. We struggled to find any rhythm and didn't have the confidence to go through the gaps.”
Tuchel continued, saying England’s performance in duels was not satisfactory: "I saw a statistic of 33 per cent of ground duels won in the first half and 73 per cent in the second, so even off the ball was not good enough, not committed enough."
England were much improved after a rousing team talk, though, and Tuchel made sure to add he was impressed by his side’s response to their slow start. “I loved the reaction of the players in the second half. It was emotional; there were a lot of emotions involved. It took us a while to get going.
“We learn a lot from these moments. We are exhausted but I loved exhausted players in the dressing room. It's pressure, it's the first game of the tournament."
