No name on the frontWhy is Jude Bellingham’s World Cup standing shaky?
Jude Bellingham is not very friendly towards the new England national football coach, Thomas Tuchel. Six months before the start of the World Cup, the squad position is uncertain.
Quick Quiz Questions: What do you know about Morgan Rogers? A little help: The 23-year-old is a midfielder in the English Premier League, where he dribbles the ball for Aston Villa. Rogers made rapid progress on the island. A few days ago he signed a new contract with much better pay. The reason is that in the summer many top clubs are already surrounding him: Liverpool FC, Chelsea FC, they are all said to be ready to offer offers of up to 100 million euros for him.
But the really important information about Rogers is something else: he could be the man to steal Jude Bellingham’s squad place in the England national team. It could be that Rogers goes to giant World Cups in the US, Canada and Mexico. As England’s new number 10 – and not the dazzling star of Real Madrid, who has also saved the “Three Lions”, for example in the last 16 of the European Championship against Slovakia. In October, Bellingham was surprisingly absent from the squad.
A World Cup without the former Dortmund player is no longer just an abstract scenario that national team coach Thomas Tuchel only highlighted during the week. Bellingham currently does not have a regular place in the national team. Rogers shone in the midfield star’s absence as he struggled with a shoulder injury. “Right now the two are competing with each other.” But this is “a friendly competition. They respect each other and fight for the same positions,” Tuchel said after the squad announcement, which also again included Bellingham’s name.
Tuchel’s mother and her show of strength
Don’t worry: no one doubts the special football skills that only Bellingham possesses. His dynamics, his effort, his dribbling, his passing power. However, the footballer who is said to be extraordinary is threatened with missing the World Cup. The reason is, national team coach Tuchel wants to form an “England Team” – and doesn’t take big names into account. It should be a “brotherhood” with a clear system, assistant coach Anthony Barry said recently. Tuchel therefore picked a tough squad for October’s internationals; it is a demonstration of power. Bellingham, Bukayo Saka, Cole Palmer, John Stones, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Jack Grealish, Phil Foden: They are all missing from the squad.
Tuchel wants to emphasize that he dares to leave big names at home in an emergency. This was not looked upon favorably on the island. Tuchel, as we recently learned in Germany, is not necessarily the easiest character. In September he criticized England fans for being too silent towards him at Wembley Stadium. It wasn’t until the 3-0 tests against Wales in October and then in Riga, Latvia, that all conflict disappeared.
Tuchel fell in love with everything: the fans, the performance. In the end everything met his expectations – even without the top stars. With a 5-0 win against Latvia, England won their first European World Cup ticket. And with impressive statistics. Tuchel’s team leads Group K without dropping points and with a goal of 18:0. Neither Albania, Serbia, Latvia, nor Andorra stand a serious chance. And to Bellingham’s dismay, Rogers, who according to Tuchel’s idea, was in control in tenth position, shone.
This is a problem for Bellingham, especially since Tuchel has clear instructions to him. The coach, who loves details, demands that the outstanding footballer, whom he repeatedly praises, puts his ego aside in the service of the team. Tuchel complained that the impulsive 22-year-old sometimes appeared to intimidate his own team-mates. An example of this is the scene from the final game where Bellingham was nominated. It was a 3-1 friendly defeat against Senegal in June.
Tuchel’s mother was the one who criticized Bellingham’s appearance. He was very annoyed with the referee because he missed his goal. Tuchel later said: “I saw it in my parents, in my mother, that she couldn’t always see the kind, educated and polite man that I saw.” Some people may find this behavior objectionable. Tuchel later apologized for the statement.
And there was a dispute with Xabi Alonso
And that’s where the second level happens. The reason is that Tuchel and Bellingham are not necessarily said to have the best relationship. When Real Madrid visited Liverpool in the Champions League last week, Tuchel and his assistant Barry disappeared from the stands. In fact, this is just a postscript, but in the British press this was interpreted as a “setback” for Bellingham. The question is, what does Tuchel want to achieve with this? By public reckoning one of England’s best footballers? Is the non-nomination a reminder? Just a show of force?
Unclear. Aside from the realization that Bellingham seems to have a problem with very detail-oriented coaches. There are also reports of this at Real Madrid. After a difficult start to the season, he has rediscovered his old strengths. He is now back after a shoulder injury: in the last five games he was directly involved in four goals. So you might think that everything is rosy in the world of royalty. But that’s not the problem.
Last season, Carlo Ancelotti coached an ensemble of restless Madrid stars. The experienced Italian controlled it by leaving the line as loose as possible. There is now a very different type of coach in Xabi Alonso, which still seems a bit odd for Real’s freedom-loving stars, according to the passionate Spanish press. The Catalan newspaper “Mundo Deportivo” even reported “cracks in the dressing room”. “The Basque coach, who is very methodical, doesn’t seem to have the approval of his players,” he said. According to the report, one of them is Bellingham who seems to be having problems with Alonso.
Such a topic has not been known about Morgan Rogers. In contrast to his relationship with Bellingham: the two are friends and have known each other for a long time. And, here’s also a heads-up: the two were born less than a 20-minute drive from each other. Bellingham in Stourbridge, Rogers in Halesowen. One of the two cities will definitely go to the World Cup.
