Forget Foden: England have better options than the Manchester City man nowplaceholder image
Forget Foden: England have better options than the Manchester City man now | AFP via Getty Images
Phil Foden is back in the England squad - but should he play ahead of players like Jude Bellingham or Marcus Rashford?
It’s been eight months since Phil Foden was last called up for England duty – eight months since his form for both club and country declined to the point at which one of the country’s most unquestionably talented players was no longer regarded as a mandatory inclusion in the squad. Now he’s back in the fold. But should he really be back in the England line-up just yet?
Foden could well start for the Three Lions in their World Cup qualifiers against Serbia and Albania over the coming week – Anthony Gordon, typically Thomas Tuchel’s first choice on the left wing, is injured, while Marcus Rashford is now the only recognised striker in the squad aside from Harry Kane and may be serving as the Bayern Munich forward’s back-up. There could also be opportunities at number 10, a position which feels up for grabs in a way that it hadn’t since Jude Bellingham first made the role his own.
But is Foden playing at a level close enough to his best for Manchester City to justify his inclusion over players like Bellingham or Morgan Rogers through the middle, or perhaps over Rashford or Eberechi Eze down the left flank?
Has Phil Foden really rediscovered his form for Manchester City?
Much of the debate over Foden’s place in the England squad has centred on his failure to find consistent form for his country, even when he was wreaking havoc on a weekly basis at the Etihad.
Foden almost always cut a slightly diminished figure under Gareth Southgate when his work for England was compared to his performances for Pep Guardiola’s side, but given his immense and undeniable talent it’s natural that Tuchel would want to make his own mind up about whether the 25-year-old is worth a spot in the side. In many ways, what Foden did under the old regime is irrelevant. He now has a blank slate to work with.
But while his natural ability is beyond reasonable doubt, he has not been quite the same player since the end of the 2023/24 season. Foden has admitted to experiencing “burnout” and mental and physical fatigue and his levels dropped precipitously at Manchester City. Since scoring 19 league goals in 2023/24, he has scored just eight in 37 Premier League matches since and has been restricted to flashes of form at best.
Green shoots have been detected this season after a difficult year, but he remains relatively unproductive. Since the start of the new campaign, he has scored four goals and three assists in 14 games – not bad, by any stretch of the imagination, but still not all that close to the kind of output we saw previously.
That’s partly explained, perhaps, by a more conservative role in Guardiola’s system which has placed him as a supporting midfielder rather than a winger or as a traditional number 10 – still, it’s worth wondering whether Foden’s form has been restored to the point at which he has become the best man for England’s left flank or the attacking midfield slot.
Foden has gone from averaging 0.57 goals per 90 minutes in 2023/24 to 0.33 and his rate of expected assists has declined by 15% since his last great season despite the fact that he is actually involved in the creation of slightly more shooting opportunities. He is taking on defenders with the ball at his feet less than half as often as he once did – again, that can be perhaps be explained in part by changes to Guardiola’s tactics, but it could also be interpreted as a sign of a player less confident in his technique and capacity to take a man on than he once was.
It’s also worth noting that there is no meaningful difference between the rate at which he has scored goals this season and last season, when his performances came in for significant and sustained criticism. In terms of his actual output, little has changed, even if he has looked a little more like his old self.
For a player whose greatest asset was the impact he had in the final third, any statistical drop-off in those areas is cause for reasonable concern. But how does he compare statistically to players like Rashford, Eze, Bellingham and Rogers, and do they deserve to be ahead of him in the pecking order?
How Foden compares to the players who could play ahead of him for England
Of course, however Foden’s form contrasts with his own past performances, the only immediately relevant question for Tuchel is whether he’s better than the other players England have in their squad right now.
With Anthony Gordon out of the picture due to a minor hip injury, Foden is one of the obvious candidates to replace him alongside Rashford or Eze – and Tuchel has shown only a limited interest in giving either of those two players starts, preferring to use them primarily from the bench so far.
Foden compares well with Eze on recent form. The former Crystal Palace man has a reasonable excuse for a relatively weak statistical output given that he is still bedding in with a new team and tactical system but he has not been able to match his work at Selhurst Park as yet – Foden is scoring at almost twice as quick of a rate this season so far, creating more than twice as many expected assists per 90 minutes and his 5.32 shooting chances created per match easily exceeds Eze’s 3.02.
Like Foden, Eze has not been at his best since making the move to Arsenal and he may well come into his own again very soon, but Foden has a strong case to be ahead of his rival whether it’s down the left flank or through the middle, at least so long as Tuchel is picking on form. If what Tuchel wants is a player willing to take a man on and beat them, however, then Eze certainly has an edge in that department, not just recently but across his career.
It's a different matter with Rashford, who is thriving at Barcelona. He’s scoring at a rate of just under a goal every other game (about 50% quicker than Foden), is creating more and better shooting opportunities in La Liga, all playing primarily on the left of a front three. If it’s the left wing role Tuchel is thinking about then Rashford should unquestionably be the form pick – as well as a fine example of the fact that talented players rarely struggle for form forever.
If the number 10 role is under consideration, then it’s very hard to make a case to start Foden over Bellingham, who is scoring at the fastest rate for Real Madrid since he joined them and found himself drafted in to play as a centre-forward during his first season. It’s almost impossible to find a relevant statistic, on or off the ball, in which Foden exceeds Bellingham at the moment.
Rogers is a rather different story. He’s a part of a struggling Aston Villa attack and while he has generally played well for England in recent outings, it’s hard to find reasons to think that he can score or provide goals more efficiently than either of his immediate rivals for the number 10 spot. He is scoring fewer goals, creating many fewer opportunities for his team-mates, and is failing to beat his man most of the time he tries to take a defender on.
Rogers has done a good job of keeping multiple defenders occupied and at linking up with the players around him in Tuchel’s system, and it may be that the head coach prizes that specific quality enough to want to include him over Bellingham or Foden – but if the priority is simply scoring and providing goals and never mind the how or why, then Rogers should be at the back of the queue at least on recent form. He has been struggling far more than Foden at club level of late.
Foden will surely get his chance to impress Tuchel at some stage, and he has such extraordinary gifts at his disposal that he may well play himself into a long-term starting spot. But he still isn’t the same player he was a couple of years ago and is lacking in certain areas compared to his immediate rivals (his work out of possession, in particular, has never been especially impressive). Whether you are picking an England team on form or playing style, there are – for now, at least – players who probably should still be ahead of him in the pecking order, and that’s before you wonder about what to do with Cole Palmer when he comes back.
None of this should be taken as a diminution of Foden. He is a capable of brilliance and if he can recapture his best form, then he should still be on track to travel to the United States next summer. But right now, he is still not playing as he has proven that he can, and other players around him are exceeding him in a number of different departments. Foden has his chance – but he will have to find a way to step up to convincingly take it.
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