Four years is a long time in football. For me, the World Cup represents much more than an exhibition of the game’s greatest on the world stage. It’s a checkpoint of reflection. I often think back to what I was doing during the last World Cup. Albeit, the 2022 edition was slightly different due to the winter kick off, but all our lives will be different when compared to those cold nights huddled in pub beer gardens.
When England touched down in Qatar for the 2022 World Cup, they did so as a team built in Gareth Southgate’s image. Cautious, structured, hard to beat. They made the quarters before a 2-1 defeat to France ended another campaign and left another generation of fans wondering what might have been. Now, in the summer of 2026, everything looks different. Different manager, different squad, different energy. But are England actually better? Let’s break it down.
THE MANAGER
The Southgate era is probably best summarised like this: he took a broken, embarrassing England team and made them competitive again. World Cup semi- final in 2018. Euros final in 2021. World Cup quarter-final in 2022. Euro final in 2024. You cannot argue with that record on paper, but you can argue with the way it was often done. Defensive setups, cautious selections, Trippier at left-back, the feeling that the team was always playing not to lose rather than to win. After eight years, the frustration had become impossible to ignore.
Tuchel was appointed after Southgate stepped down following England’s loss in the Euro 2024 final to Spain. He becomes only the third foreign manager to take charge of England, after Sven Goran Eriksson and Fabio Capello. That fact alone tells you how significant a shift this was, and it did not go down well everywhere. “German spy” accusations were undeservingly thrown around as his appointment sparked controversy among the English fan base, with many expressing frustration at the FA for hiring a foreign manager. Tuchel addressed the criticism in his first press conference, saying: “Sorry, I have a German passport.” Fair enough, really.
What Tuchel brings that Southgate never quite managed is a genuine tactical identity and knockout football prowess. An attacking philosophy, a clear system, a willingness to make brutal calls on big names. He is a Champions League winner. He has managed at the very top level across four countries. Going into Qatar in 2022, the question around the manager was always whether he would be bold enough. Going into 2026, no one is asking that question. In a recent clip posted by the England YouTube channel, Tuchel poses a mission to his squad: achieving the second star on the badge.
THE SQUAD
England’s 2026 World Cup squad features 17 changes from the group that competed in Qatar four years ago. That is a staggering level of turnover, even across a four-year period. Only nine players survive across both squads: Pickford, Kane, Stones, Rice, Bellingham, Saka, Rashford, Watkins and Henderson. Gone are Kyle Walker, Harry Maguire, Kieran Trippier, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Phil Foden, Jack Grealish, Raheem Sterling, Mason Mount and James Maddison.
In their place, players like Kobbie Mainoo, Morgan Rogers, Nico O’Reilly, Eberechi Eze, Noni Madueke, Elliot Anderson and Jarell Quansah. The average age has dropped, the profile of the squad has changed and the whole thing feels considerably less like a collection of household names and more like a hungry, cohesive unit.
The omissions have been genuinely shocking by any metric. Phil Foden and Cole Palmer, the latter starring in the Nike World Cup advert, are two of the most naturally gifted attacking players in the country and were both left out after difficult club seasons. Real Madrid defender Trent Alexander-Arnold, one of the best full-backs of his generation, has barely featured under Tuchel and was not considered. Whether those calls prove to be bold or disastrous will be answered in North America this summer.
In 2022, the squad felt like it had a glass ceiling, a collection of good players who were perhaps a little short of world class beyond Kane and Bellingham. In 2026, the spine of the team is better and more battle-hardened, even if the names around the edges are less glamorous.
CULTURAL CHANGES
This is perhaps the most peculiar shift of all, and the hardest to quantify. Under Southgate, the England camp had a particular feel: corporate, media-trained, cautious off the pitch as well as on it. That was partly by design. Southgate wanted to depoliticise and instead unionise the team and give the players a sense of safety, which he largely achieved. But it also created a certain blandness that grated on supporters who wanted to see more personality.
Tuchel has been notably more direct. He came in promising attacking football, gave honest assessments of players in press conferences and made it clear from day one that he was not interested in sentiment when it came to selection. He said of his squad: “I can assure every fan in the country that we have 26 one hundred per cent committed players in camp who know their roles, who are ready to buy into their role on and off the pitch and are ready and committed to the idea of team spirit and being unselfish.” That language, centred on roles, commitment and selflessness, represents a genuine cultural shift from a squadthat sometimes looked like a group of individual talents failing to function as a team. Just look at the run to the Euro 2024 final.
The average age of the squad is younger, there are six players who have won youth titles with England, and the whole thing feels more energised. Whether that translates from the training ground to the tournament remains the question.
FA AND BACKROOM STAFF
When Southgate left, the FA did not just change the manager, they changed the entire backroom philosophy. FA CEO Mark Bullingham stated publicly that the appointment of Tuchel was made with the explicit ambition of winning the 2026 World Cup. That kind of directness from the FA has not always been there in previous cycles, where the language was often vague and the strategy unclear.
Tuchel brought with him Anthony Barry as assistant coach, an Englishman he had worked with at both Chelsea and Bayern Munich. Barry is widely regarded as one of the best coaches in the world at his level and his presence gives the setup a continuity and familiarity that helps. This is not a Tuchel solo project. It is a proper coaching team with shared language and shared methods. Barry has stated that there is no other coach in the world he would have left Chelsea for other than Tuchel.
The FA’s process was also notably more rigorous this time around. Bullingham revealed that the FA had done significant work before Euro 2024 on what the ideal profile of a new England manager looked like, and that Tuchel had always been on their target list. That kind of pre-planning is a departure from previous cycles where the FA often looked reactive and chaotic in their decision making.
FAN EXPECTATIONS: 2022 VS NOW
Going into Qatar, England fans were cautiously optimistic but the mood was complicated. There was genuine excitement about Bellingham and the young core, but the form leading into the tournament had been poor, with England having gone six competitive games without a win heading into the tournament.
The trust in Southgate was fraying at the edges after years of conservative football, and the feeling that the window might be closing was starting to creep in.
Now in 2026 the mood feels different, though not necessarily more relaxed. The optimism is sharper, more targeted. Tuchel has given fans a reason to believe in the system rather than just the players. The qualification campaign was flawless, with England being the only team to win every game and not concede a single goal. The squad feels like it has genuine direction and the football, at its best, has been genuinely exciting to watch.But England fans are a uniquely anxious breed. The hope of ending a 60-year wait for a major tournament win in the men’s game is constantly balanced against self-preservation instincts honed by decades of disappointment. The optimism in 2026 is real, but so is the fear. We have been here before. Multiple finals, multiple quarter-finals, multiple early exits at previous World Cups. This generation has come closer than most, and that proximity to glory makes every tournament feel heavier than the last.
CONCLUSION: ARE ENGLAND BETTER OR WORSE?
Better. On almost every measure.
The manager is more decorated and more tactically ambitious. The squad is younger, more cohesive and built around a clearer identity. The backroom setup is more professional and the FA appears to have made a genuinely strategic decision rather than a reactive one. The group stage draw is kinder than 2022, the players are more experienced having been through multiple tournament runs together, and there is a genuine sense that this team knows how to win when it matters.
The caveats are real though. Key players arrive with injury concerns. The heat and travel demands across North America are unlike anything England have dealt with before. Tuchel is unproven at international tournament level. And England remain England, a team with an almost supernatural ability to find new ways to fall short.
In 2022, England were a good team without a clear direction. In 2026, they are a team with a plan. Whether the plan works is another matter entirely. But for the first time in a while, the question feels like it is worth asking.
