England tactics: How Jude Bellingham became Thomas Tuchel’s most important player
In June 2024, Jude Bellingham scored a dramatic 95th-minute overhead kick against Slovakia to save England’s Euro hopes.
In the heat of the moment, he celebrated by shouting to the enthusiastic crowd.
“Who else?”
The 22-year-old football player’s performance after England’s 2-0 victory against Panama evokes a similar feeling.
Tuchel has been firm in stating that his system and approach will look largely the same throughout the tournament, but on Saturday we saw tweaks to the squad due to injuries.
Bellingham was central to maximizing that system and patching some of the cracks along the way.
It was a tale of two halves for Bellingham, who was assigned more of a box-to-box role in Declan Rice’s absence.
England opted to attack from the back in their first two matches, with two centre-backs and Elliott Anderson in the middle of the field. Both full-backs took up wider positions, while Rice and Bellingham left their midfield areas for Harry Kane to come in and join Anderson.
This shape was different from Panama.
Jarell Quansah moved into the right-back position, replacing the injured Reece James, and was asked to be in the back three alongside Marc Guehi and Ezri Konsa. Nico O’Reilly retained his central left-back role.
Instead of Kane dropping deep, Bellingham was tasked with supporting Anderson at the base of midfield, and England’s shape on the ball loosely varied between 3-2-5 and 3-1-6 depending on how Bellingham read the game.
After the match, Tuchel confirmed his intentions, explaining that Bellingham “plays number 10 when we have the ball” and that he wants to “have six players on the end line”, presumably in an attempt to outnumber Panama’s five players at the back.
