“He loves these pressure games” — Tuchel hails Bellingham as England down Croatia 4-2 | OneFootball

Thomas Tuchel has said pressure brings out the best in Jude Bellingham for England.

Bellingham scored the crucial third goal as England beat Croatia 4-2 in theirWorld Cup opener on Wednesday night.

The Real Madrid midfielder's place in the side had been a talking point ahead of the clash, but Bellingham was named in the starting side in Texas. He delivered a fine all-action performance, as England produced a superb second-half performance to take the points.

Harry Kane scored twice for England, with Bellingham and Marcus Rashford also on target.

Bellingham's surging run and finish fired England 3-2 ahead early in the second half, after Croatia had twice come from behind to equalise before the break.

Tuchel praised the performance of the 22-year-old at full-time and said Bellingham can be relied upon when the pressure is on.

“You can rely on Jude in these moments” — Tuchel lauds Bellingham’s clutch England winner

"You can rely on Jude in these moments. He loves these pressure games. That brings out the best in him,"said Tuchel.

"It's an easy decision to let him play and trust him, also because of the last 17 days how he bought into the idea of team spirit, the idea of brotherhood and the idea of how we want to play football which is a slightly different position to his position in Real Madrid.

"The tough decision was to say to Morgan Rogers he will not start because he deserves 100 per cent to start and he did ever so well for us and me.

"Jude was very reliable and did his very best to be a top team player for us.

"We do this as a team. The team and every player is ready to do it as a team. We can just do it together as a group if we want to push it all the way and today was a very good first step."