National team captain Harry Kane has confirmed the five senior stars who now make up England's leadership group under Thomas Tuchel. With the German set to take charge of the final game of his first year in charge tonight against Albania, World Cup qualification has already been confirmed.
Tuchel has impressed so far early on in his time with the Three Lions, winning all but one of his nine games so far – and conceding just three goals, which all came in the 3-1 loss to Senegal. Even so, there is still plenty to play for between now and the start of the 2026 tournament, with spaces in the World Cup squad up for grabs.
That said, Tuchel will no doubt already have a core group in his mind whom he intends to rely upon. And with that selection of players, he appears to have an even smaller group of five who will make up his leadership team.
Jude Bellingham Named Among Tuchel's Leadership Group
Tuchel England Squad
As reported by The Mirror, captain Kane named the five players in question when speaking ahead of today's game vs Albania. He revealed that Jude Bellingham, Marc Guehi, Bukayo Saka and Declan Rice have joined him in taking up the responsibility:
“We have some newer leaders coming through, rather than some of the guys like Walks (Kyle Walker) and Harry Maguire, who were a big part of the leadership group in the past. We’ve got new ones like Marc and Jude and Bukayo, Dec obviously.
“So maybe just a bit more added responsibility to help those guys and to lead by example in that way. I just feel in a good moment.
“Always when you’re in good form yourself and you’re feeling confident, that gives you more expression to be a bit louder and be a bit more expressive in the changing-room or on the pitch.
“I always try and do it anyway but, yeah, I just think maybe the form as well that I’m in helps me to do that a little bit more as well.”
All five men were key players at Euro 2024, and the likes of Kane, Rice and Saka already established themselves as stars when England made the Euro 2020 final.
Bellingham's status in world football – a Champions League and La Liga winner with Real Madrid, no less – makes him a fairly obvious candidate for an elevated role in the team. That said, his position isn't guaranteed in the starting XI, with Morgan Rogers preferred as the number 10 in recent times and doubts expressed over how he fits into the team alongside Kane and Phil Foden. With that in mind, it's interesting that Tuchel has shown some faith by handing him this extra responsibility.
Some may raise a few eyebrows at Guehi's inclusion, simply because he isn't quite as big a star as the other four members. Even so, he was one of the Three Lions' best players at Euro 2024, and also captained Crystal Palace to FA Cup glory just last summer.
Perhaps the biggest surprise is that experienced figures like Jordan Pickford, John Stones, and, to a lesser extent, Reece James weren't mentioned. The same can be said of Jordan Henderson, but Tuchel may have felt the duty was best assigned to fresher blood.