2026-06-09 13:30:45

Darren Bazeley thinks England need to improve markedly if they’re to win the World Cup.

The Three Lions defeated Bazeley’s New Zealand team 1-0 in Florida over the weekend, but the Kiwi boss insists England’s performance won’t be good enough for them to win the World Cup.

Speaking after the match, Bazeley said: “I think most countries, including England today, when they’re playing their first game, they want to get everybody good minutes, acclimatised, get the legs moving heading into the World Cup.

“England were good today, but they need to be better to go and win the World Cup than they were today, even though they won the game.”

Despite this, England coach Thomas Tuchel was pleased with the preparation game, as it allowed them to acclimatise to the heat and humidity they might experience throughout the tournament.

The former Chelsea and Bayern Munich coach said: “[The pitch] was very difficult to play on. We have no injuries and there were no concerns but it was very uneven, very uneven. It was difficult to move the ball and move the ball quickly. When you have the ball for the majority of the match, it doesn’t help you.

“We have four training sessions together and we mixed the team up completely, so we never played before in these combinations and formation. Then you have the conditions, the pitch, it can look like this.”

Despite this, Tuchel acknowledged that he wasn’t hugely impressed by his team in Tampa.

He said: “I’m not super happy about it. I liked the second half more than the first half.

“I think we had more bite in the second half, were more aggressive on and off the ball, created a bit more. Some good half chances and some good penetrations into the box. We played more from our positions and that’s why we played with more speed.

“The first half we were out of positions and it was a bit too much freestyle. That slowed our game down and made it difficult for counter-press because we were not in the positions that we wanted to be when we started attacking, so that’s basically the story of the match.”

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