Thomas Tuchel said he is impatient to see improvement from his England side and believes there is no need to “sugarcoat” criticism after an underwhelming 1-0 victory over minnows Andorra on Saturday.
The Three Lions came under fire for their sloppy performance in the World Cup qualifier in Barcelona, where Harry Kane scored the only goal early in the second half.
They were booed after struggling to break down a team ranked 173rd in the world even though they extended Tuchel’s winning start to three games.
“I’m impatient and want to do better,” the former Chelsea and Paris Saint-Germain boss said ahead of Tuesday’s friendly against Senegal in Nottingham.
“We are thinking about giving the players a little bit more freedom in the structure — let’s see.
“Tomorrow we face a more physical and demanding team. On paper it might not look as offensive as we were against Andorra but will give the players more freedom to express themselves and hopefully we see that on Tuesday.”
A serial winner of major titles, Tuchel was appointed as the third foreign coach of England to great fanfare, but he has so far failed to deliver on the exciting brand of football he promised.
His reign began with a 2-0 win over Albania and 3-0 victory against Latvia in March.
England captain Kane conceded the Euro 2024 finalists had “got away with one” given their lacklustre performance in front of a small crowd at Espanyol’s RCDE Stadium.
“I think there was commonsense straight after in the dressing room,” said Tuchel.
“We underperformed clearly in the physical input in the game which you could see on the sideline and the data. We didn’t run enough.”
The German said he believed in brutal honesty.
“I protect my players, I said no names of players,” he said. “We as a team didn’t match our standards.
“I didn’t like the last 10 minutes, I felt on the sidelines. We didn’t play seriously enough to win it in the end and what we needed to do in a World Cup qualifier.
“Everything I say here I say to the players, why should I sugarcoat? There is no harm done, we can have criticism and I believe a group of players in football can speak honestly to each other.
“I always include myself in that — now it’s on us to do better. The attitude towards training and the camp and commitment is outstanding. Everybody wanted to be there and be involved, they wanted to start and wanted to play. We will analyse and try to do better.”
