Thomas Tuchel faces a significant challenge as he seeks to maximize Harry Kane’s contributions while encouraging more involvement from his teammates. Jude Bellingham’s standout performance against Panama illuminated how to effectively address both aspects of this dilemma.
Kane has netted 13 goals in Tuchel’s 17 matches as England manager, yet no other player has managed more than three goals. His scoring included a penalty and a header against Croatia, along with a missed rebound opportunity during the match with Ghana. However, opportunities for him in open play have been limited.
Typically, a center-forward receives fewer passes than other players (although Kane often attempts to rectify this by dropping deeper into midfield), but England’s issue has been the lack of effective players delivering the ball to their star striker during the tournament. Unfortunately, the players providing these passes have often fallen short of expectations.
In the opening match, Jordan Pickford was among those who provided the most passes to Kane, totaling three, with Marc Guéhi matching that in the second match. Against Panama, three players managed four passes to him, but Bellingham required only two to demonstrate that quality outweighs quantity.
It is somewhat surprising that Bellingham, now with Real Madrid, and Kane have not formed a stronger connection on the international stage. Data from Opta indicates that prior to the Panama match, Bellingham had created merely three chances for England’s all-time leading scorer over 1,154 minutes played together in major tournaments.
Before this World Cup, the only goal they had collaborated on in an international match occurred during a friendly victory at Hampden Park in 2023. A similar pass that unlocked Scotland’s defense on that occasion proved effective once more against Panama.
In the first 56 minutes against Panama, England had generated only 0.54 expected goals until a precise through ball from Bellingham set up Kane for their first significant scoring opportunity. In the following ten minutes, the midfielder not only won a corner but also scored from it and assisted Kane for England’s second goal.
Opta tracks a metric known as expected assists, which calculates the probability of completed passes becoming assists. Bellingham’s passes against Panama were valued at 0.57, the highest for any England player in a group match. Noni Madueke (at 0.66) was the only other team member to achieve a higher total across all three games.
The passes Bellingham provided to Kane contributed significantly to this tally. In terms of expected goals, the chances he created ranked as the second and joint-fourth highest opportunities any England player set up during the group stage.
The task for Tuchel is to ensure that such successful moments become a regular feature, especially with the Democratic Republic of the Congo expected to adopt a defensive strategy in their upcoming match.
- World Cup 2026
- Jude Bellingham
- Harry Kane
- England
- World Cup
- analysis
