‘Gutted’ Marc Guehi blames Thomas Tuchel’s disastrous strategy for England’s World Cup collapse

The finger-pointing around England has spread to its players.
Marc Guehi took shots at manager Thomas Tuchel’s defensive tactics after Argentina shattered England’s dreams of soccer finally coming home in the World Cup semifinal on Tuesday.
“Once we went 1-0 up, we seemed to just try and hold on, which at this level is just not enough, so I’m gutted,” the centerback told BBC Sport after the final whistle.
“We should have carried on. We should have carried on pushing. It kind of felt like we scored and the mentality was, go back, defend.”
England took a 1-0 lead thanks to an Anthony Gordon goal in the 55th minute, but decided to protect the lead rather than try and extend it.
In the 72nd minute, Tuchel took off goalscorer and winger Gordon in favor of centerback Ezri Konsa, putting England in a back five.
Ten minutes later, Reece James, Harry Kane and Declan Rice came off for Dan Burn, another centerback, left back Nico O’Reilly, and striker Ollie Watkins.
This left England with four centerbacks and two left backs on the field with 10 minutes plus stoppage time to stop Messi and his coharts.
Not a good idea.
Messi took over and provided two assists to help Argentina take a 2-1 lead and another comeback victory.
“If it doesn’t go well, it’s easy to say that it was wrong,” Tuchel told the BBC. “We just tried to help the players. We conceded straight away. We decided to go to a back five because the gaps were far too open.”
Tuchel reasoned that after the goal the team was dealing with a lot of pressure and he wanted to help the players suffer less, bringing on aerial dual artists like Burn to help in the defensive box.

Every match of the FIFA World Cup will air on either FOX or FOX Sports 1. If you don’t have cable, you can take advantage of a DIRECTV free trial to stream it all.
Prefer to check out the action live and in person? Shop World Cup 2026 tickets on SeatGeek and make sure to use promo code NYPOST10 for $10 off purchases over $250 at checkout if you’re a first-time SeatGeek user.
The German manager left attacking options like Premier League winner Bukayo Saka and La Liga winner Marcus Rashford completely out of the game.
“Of course we wanted to go for the second goal but I didn’t feel an offensive substitution would help,” Tuchel said.
Messi said after the game, the change in tactics also shifted England’s mindset. He felt they stopped attacking the game and going for a win.
“We felt they didn’t want it anymore and we just kept coming, that’s why after the 1-1, the crowd helped us again once more, and as I said, we are happy because it was a close match,” Messi said.
“We always want to win, and also because it takes us to play another World Cup final.”