Thomas Tuchel makes surprise England claim as Croatia loom in World Cup opener

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Evening Standard

·11 giugno 2026

Thomas Tuchel makes surprise England claim as Croatia loom in World Cup opener

Three Lions face tough test in Group L curtain-raiser as they reunite with 2018 semi-final opponents

Thomas Tuchel has insisted that he still does not know his starting lineup for England’s World Cup opener against Croatia, which is now less than a week away.

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The Three Lions begin their Group L campaign in Arlington next Wednesday, yet the head coach says he still has some tough selection calls to make.

England beat Costa Rica 3-0 in their final pre-tournament warm-up game on Wednesday as Declan Rice, Anthony Gordon and Ollie Watkins all scored at Inter&Co Stadium in Orlando after thunderstorms caused kick-off to be delayed by an hour.

Some positions such as left wing, centre-back and No10 appear to be less clear-cut than others when it comes to who will start for England against Croatia.

Asked whether he already knows his XI for that curtain-raiser, Tuchel told ITV after the win over Costa Rica: “No. I will have to find now an XI for tomorrow’s game. And then I have another six days, I think.”

On Thursday, England face amateur American side Miami United in an unofficial behind-closed-doors training game, where players less heavily involved against Costa Rica will run through set-pieces and other in-game situations. The match will be stop-start.

“We do a match tomorrow, another friendly match to get some minutes into the legs of the players who didn’t play so much today,” Tuchel added.

Food for thought: Thomas Tuchel says he does not yet know his starting XI to open the World Cup against Croatia

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“And then the players get one-and-a-half days off, to switch off physically and mentally. Then we go to Kansas [City] and prepare for Croatia.”

Reflecting on the performance against Costa Rica, which came after Saturday’s tougher 1-0 victory over New Zealand in Tampa, Tuchel said: “We did very well, and we deserved to win.

“We should have had more goals. We could have easily scored more, we created a lot. But the attitude, the energy, the intensity was on a very high level.

“Everyone did well. It is not about one individual player today. A very good team performance and we want to have this push to the next level, and we clearly got it.

“We worked hard, counter-pressing was good, and togetherness. Everything on a very, very high level.

“Tonight makes my mind very calm as we're absolutely on the right way. The guys who came in were super-influential. The guys who came out were pushing from behind on the bench. It was exactly what we wanted.”