Simon Jordan makes England ‘doom’ claim and explains why jury is still out on Thomas Tuchel
The mood around the England men’s national team is jubilant coming out of the international break after Thomas Tuchel’s side thrashed Serbia 5-0 in Belgrade.
England had underwhelmed against Andorra on Saturday, slogging to a 2-0 victory at Villa Park, on an evening that left a sour taste for Tuchel.
The performance against Serbia was better as England confidently and clinically dispatched the Balkan side who have been otherwise quite robust so far in World Cup qualifying.
Heading into the match Serbia hadn’t conceded a goal in the opening three games of their qualifying campaign, but Tuchel’s England had other ideas.
Harry Kane scored the first goal, before Noni Madueke scored his first England goal off the back of a promising performance against Andorra.
Ezri Konsa and Marc Guehi added goals either side of Nottingham Forest’s Nikola Milenkovic getting sent off for Serbia, and Marcus Rashford made in five from the penalty spot late on.
England’s international break ends on a high
While England have made qualifying hard work for themselves, Tuchel’s side have begun their campaign in fine fashion winning all five of their qualifiers.
After the positive performance, talkSPORT’s Simon Jordan discussed the match, and jokingly added his own takeaway from the performance, saying: “Where are we on the sensation meter today? Doom? We’re going to win the World Cup? We’re going to win the World Cup!”
Jordan then continued in a more serious fashion, saying: “It was a good performance, they got the job done. I mean ultimately, England did what they should have done and they did it very well and in a very accomplished fashion.
“We normally go through the World Cup qualifying groups, all of those are fine for me [England’s results so far in qualifying],” he continued
“It’s when we come up against the opposition that we’ve come up against repeatedly over the last eight years where we’ve got the on paper position of not being favourites, and out we go. This is what Tuchel was brought in for, those games.
“If you’ve got a swathe of young players who are proving to step up to international level in a position where the established order is already there, like Jude Bellingham, then it keeps Bellingham honest in his intentions, in what he has to deliver for his country,” Jordan finished.
England divide opinion as Thomas Tuchel’s small sample size impacts squad selection
Football Insider verdict
Tuchel faced the tough task of selecting his England squad based off of two competitive fixtures ahead of this international break.
In four weeks time Tuchel will select his squad again, and as the Champions League kicks off again in that timeframe, the German will have a larger sample size to select his squad from.
The performance against Andorra was turgid, and England’s lack of confidence to breakdown the visitors’ low-block was frustrating to watch.
| England under Thomas Tuchel | Score |
| vs Ireland | 5-0 |
| vs Greece | 3-0 |
| vs Latvia | 3-0 |
| vs Albania | 2-0 |
| vs Senegal | 1-3 |
| vs Andorra | 1-0 |
| vs Andorra | 2-0 |
| vs Serbia | 5-0 |
Against Serbia, it was clear to see that with more time on the training pitch, and more minutes under the belts of Madueke, Rice, and Kane was the catalyst for a much more decisive attacking performance from Tuchel’s side.
As the season goes on and players begin to play with more rhythm and momentum, Tuchel’s squad will likely perform better and yield stringer results in the lead up to the World Cup.