England’s Unfinished Business: Why Tuchel’s Croatia Test Is the Most Important Moment in a Generation
Photo by Fauzan Saari on Unsplash
Thomas Tuchel has built something quietly compelling in England — but Group L opens against the side that broke them in 2018, and everything about this squad will be judged on what happens in Dallas on 17 June.
The last time England played Croatia at a World Cup, they led at half-time and still lost. Kieran Trippier’s free-kick gave a nation 45 minutes of something close to genuine belief, and then Mario Mandzukic converted Perisic’s cross in the 109th minute and the bubble burst again in the way England bubbles so reliably do. That was Moscow, July 2018. Now they meet again in Arlington, Texas, on 17 June 2026, and the weight of history is only half the story.
The other half belongs to Thomas Tuchel, who has done something quietly unusual in the 18 months since taking charge. He has looked at England’s Premier League spine, decided it was not enough on its own, and made selections accordingly. Phil Foden is not in the squad. Neither is Cole Palmer. Trent Alexander-Arnold, who averaged more than 8.3 progressive passes per 90 across his last 30 Premier League appearances, was also left out. These were not accidents. Tuchel appears to have decided that adaptability and physicality will serve England better in a 48-team tournament played across two time zones and several climates than technical refinement alone.
Kane, Bellingham, and the Weight of Club Form
Harry Kane arrives at this World Cup in a condition that has no real precedent for an England captain. He scored 58 goals across all competitions for Bayern Munich this season, including 36 in 31 Bundesliga appearances, averaging a goal every 66 minutes in the German top flight. He won the Torjagerkanone for the third consecutive year, becoming the first player in Bundesliga history to achieve that feat in each of his first three seasons at a club. Forty-one of Bayern’s 122 Bundesliga goals this season involved him directly.
The question that has followed Kane at every major tournament, that of whether extraordinary club production translates to international knockout football, still has no clean answer. In Qatar, he scored twice in the group stage and then missed a penalty against France. At Euro 2024, he scored from open play for the first time in a tournament knockout round. The trajectory is pointing forward, but tournaments require a different kind of ruthlessness, and Kane has not yet had one where England needed him to deliver in the way a final-round match demands.
Jude Bellingham, 22 years old and carrying the No 10 shirt, represents the fulcrum of what Tuchel is trying to build. His role is not simply to collect the ball and play forward passes. The data from his work at Real Madrid shows that Bellingham covers significant defensive ground too, averaging more than 5.1 km of high-intensity running per 90 minutes in his last 15 La Liga appearances. Tuchel wants that work rate in the middle third, with Declan Rice providing the anchor behind and Kobbie Mainoo offering the close-control option to switch tempo.
What Croatia Can Still Do
It would be a mistake to dismiss Croatia as a side on the wane. They reached the bronze medal match at the 2022 World Cup, conceding only five goals across six games. Luka Modric, now 40, confirmed he would be at this tournament and his involvement in Croatia’s preparation camps has been significant. He started their final warm-up match against Slovenia in May and delivered 87 accurate passes from 93 attempted in 62 minutes.
Croatia’s more relevant threat may come from the wings. Ivan Perisic retired from international football in 2023, but Marko Livaja and Ante Budimir have provided consistent forward runs in the qualifying cycle. Croatia conceded just four goals in their European qualifying group, finishing above Turkey and Wales. Their defensive organisation under Zlatko Dalic has not deteriorated, and England have historically struggled when opponents sit in a 4-4-2 mid-block and ask them to break it down through central areas.
“England will have the ball for long stretches,” one analyst noted. “The test is not whether Tuchel’s side can dominate possession in the first 20 minutes. It is whether Kane and Bellingham can combine to find the pockets between Croatia’s midfield and back four when the tempo drops and the game becomes attritional. That’s where England have consistently stalled.”
Tuchel’s Tactical Gamble and the Betting Market
The squad selection tells you something about how Tuchel intends to approach the group stage. Nico O’Reilly, one of nine first-time tournament players in the 26-man squad, offers versatility at left-back that allows England to shift between a back four and a three-two-five shape depending on the game state. Elliot Anderson, who made the No 6 role his own at Nottingham Forest this season with 74 accurate ball progressions in his last 20 Premier League starts, gives Tuchel a more expansive holding option than England have previously had access to at a major tournament.
Speaking to Freebets.com, the independent editorial platform dedicated to expert-reviewed World Cup betting sites and other betting guidance, one analyst observed: “England are among the favourites to progress from Group L, and the betting market has priced Croatia at around 4/1 to win in Dallas, odds that carry some logic given what happened in Moscow eight years ago. But this England side has a structural discipline in defence that the 2018 version lacked, and Tuchel has shown at Chelsea and Bayern that he can organise a backline quickly.”
England qualified for this tournament without conceding a single goal across eight matches, finishing ten points clear of Albania in their UEFA group. That record came against limited opposition, but the defensive habits Tuchel has embedded, with Marc Guehi and John Stones as the central partnership and Rice operating immediately in front of them, are not trivial achievements. Stones has played through fitness concerns but trained fully in Florida, and Tuchel confirmed on 2 June that he expects all 26 players to be available for the Croatia opener.
The Wider Picture: Group L and What Comes After
Ghana and Panama complete Group L, and on paper England should collect maximum points from both. Ghana, ranked 74th in the world, are led by Antoine Semenyo, whose pace on the counter could cause England problems in wide areas, but they lack the depth to sustain pressure for 90 minutes. Panama, who England beat 6-1 in Volgograd in 2018, are 33rd in the FIFA rankings but have qualified on the strength of defensive structure rather than forward quality.
Topping the group matters for more than points. England’s potential path from Group L avoids Spain, France and Argentina until the semi-finals at the earliest. If they finish second, the route narrows considerably. The seeding system introduced for this expanded 48-team format has handed England a structural advantage that depends entirely on starting well.
That begins on 17 June in a stadium with the air conditioning on, against the same country that last ended an England World Cup dream with extra-time football. The context is different now. The manager is different. The squad has been built around a specific tactical philosophy rather than assembled from reputations. Whether any of that translates into a result that matters is what this tournament will reveal.