The turning point of Thomas Tuchel's reign, finally

Can you do much better than win?

In the eyes of England fans, the answer is always yes.

Gareth Southgate reached two European Championship finals and a World Cup semi-final in his tenure and managed the most games in the post since Alf Ramsey. Yet England fans still never seemed convinced so when Thomas Tuchel came in and replicated Southgate’s winning ways despite unconvincing scorelines and lacklustre performances, disappointment still remained.

The 5-0 drumming of Serbia was needed for Tuchel, that’s the fact. Despite the friendly defeat to Senegal in June which seems to have fallen to the back of the minds of supporters, England are yet to concede in competition under the German, notching up 10 hours in the recent World Cup Qualifier.

So why is it that England’s so-called toughest test was without a doubt their best performance?

Well, I’m not sure what Tuchel said to the players following a 2-0 win over Andorra but, “it’s still not good enough” and, “we’re playing well and a big win will come” would’ve both felt correct and sufficient.

Without getting carried away, this was the best, most creative and free performance, even without Bukayo Saka, Jude Bellingham, Phil Foden, Cole Palmer to name a few. Everything seemed to click (even if it was a poor Serbia display.) Noni Madueke has looked as good as ever in the past two matches, Elliot Anderson has proven to be a great find at international level and a centre-back pairing of Ezri Konsa and Marc Guehi doesn’t look unlikely to play in big tournaments.

Tuchel has also stuck with his 4-1-4-1 system (as defensive as it sounds, fans have been able to get behind it much more than a Southgate five-back). The faith and confidence he’s shown looks a natural ooze of the best manager England have had in some time. Still more to be proven but if there’s anything we’ve learnt from the Serbia game is that England can be good.

The issues with previous games have been nothing other than ruthlessness. The missing creative players shouldn’t be the reason of England not beating Andorra by more than two goals. And it’s not just that. It’s the 3-1 defeat to Senegal that came before (oh yeah, remember that?), beating Andorra 1-0, Latvia 3-0 wasn’t even enough and Albania 2-0, not enough.

Take this as a positive, or take it as a negative but England were still not at their best. A few moments of misguided chemistry from Reece James and Madueke on the right flank, Tino Livramento and Anthony Gordon struggling to get involved on the left, Declan Rice not quite the seamless number eight and Jordan Pickford’s near embarrassing short-pass mess springing to mind. But it was 5-0.

Five different goal scorers, a classy move for Madueke’s showing how easy it is with the near second-string squad’s talent, a pin-point corner and header for Kane’s and selection headaches for Tuchel to come all positive.

But at least, and the most important point of this weekend is that England have finally proved under Thomas Tuchel after six competitive, consecutive wins and never any doubt of comfort, they can do more than just win.