Thomas Tuchel wants to bring hunger and excitement back to England having felt Sir Gareth Southgate’s side were inhibited by a fear of failure at last summer’s European Championship.
The 51-year-old is preparing to lead the national team for the first time on Friday as the road to next summer’s shot at World Cup glory gets under way with a sold-out Wembley qualifier against Albania.
The Football Association has tasked Tuchel with getting England over the line having gone so close under Southgate, who oversaw World Cup semi-final and quarter-final appearances along with reaching back-to-back Euros finals.
But last summer’s run to the Berlin showpiece was quite underwhelming, with the new head coach telling ITV that he felt England “were more afraid to drop out of the tournament than having the excitement and hunger to win it”.
“I think it has to be the other way around,” Tuchel said in the pre-match press conference. “I want us to play with the excitement, the hunger and the desire to win – and the joy to win and the acceptance of failure is a part of it, especially in football.
“But we want to implement this togetherness and the joy, that everyone feels safe to express themselves and give their very best and we play (in a way) that it’s recognisable.
“We play with the hunger and the joy to win and not with the fear to lose.”
Tuchel saw “tension and pressure on the shoulders” of the team in Germany and wants to help reprogramme England’s players.
“The players know my assessment (of the Euros) but it’s not even addressed backwards,” Tuchel said. “It’s addressed ‘what I want now’ and ‘where I think we can improve’. The message is up front. That was my observation.
“I got a lot of feedback from it. They made their way to the semi-final and then to the final. I felt they were holding back, the group did not play with enough excitement and togetherness to make it happen.”
Sir Alf Ramsey’s 1966 World Cup heroes remain the only men to have won a major trophy with England, although Tuchel joked “there is still debate” given the controversy over Sir Geoff Hurst’s second goal.
The German coach said with a smile he did not think the ball had crossed the line as he laughed off the matter in a week that started with him stressing to players how he wants to add another star to the shirt.
Tuchel tried to extinguish talk of the jersey weighing heavy and, like predecessor Southgate, indicated that England need to earn the right to be considered among the best given they are not “serial winners”.
“The tradition for the national team is not to win and we have to maybe accept that once we arrive in America maybe we are not the favourites,” Tuchel said.
“Maybe we are kind of the underdogs and we embrace this role and make the best of it, because there are more stars on the shirts of Brazil, the likes of Germany, Spain recently.
“They have more success so we are maybe not the favourites just because we all play in the best league and maybe have a lot of titles within this league.
“There is no rule that we cannot make it from the role of an underdog. This can maybe help us to change the perception a little bit. That we don’t arrive and say that if we don’t win it is a complete disaster.”
Right now, it is about starting qualification with a bang against Albania.
“We have a full Wembley, it will be very exciting,” Tuchel added. “I will be bit nervous, I guess and that’s part of it. I’m always a bit nervous before matches, so this will not be different.”
