England head coach Thomas Tuchel admitted Jude Bellingham was \u201clucky\u201d to escape a red card during his side\u2019s routine 3-0 World Cup qualifying win over Latvia at Wembley.<\/p>\n
Having already been booked in the first half, Bellingham looked fortunate to escape a second yellow for a mis-timed challenge on Raivis Jurkovskis shortly after the restart, and was replaced by Phil Foden.<\/p>\n
Tuchel, who two days ago had called on Bellingham to be \u201cmore disciplined\u201d, questioned the first yellow card but told ITV Sport: \u201cWe were a bit lucky, and took straight away the decision to not take the risk and take him off.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tuchel believed he saw improvement on England\u2019s win over Albania in his first match in charge last week, and reserved special praise for Reece James, who opened the scoring after a two-year absence from the national team.<\/p>\n
Tuchel added: \u201cIt was not an easy match, we had to unlock it, but there were a lot of good things \u2013 another clean sheet and we created a lot of chances from set-pieces.<\/p>\n
\u201cOK, we needed a free-kick to unlock it, but in general I\u2019m happy with the attitude and energy and desire to do the stuff that we want.\u201d<\/p>\n
Reece James scored a stunning free-kickReferring to James, who previously played under Tuchel at Chelsea, and opened the scoring with a delicious curling free-kick, Tuchel added: \u201cI know Reece and I know the foot and the quality the boy has.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe is amazing, he has every right to be proud and happy and satisfied with his performance.\u201d<\/p>\n
James relished his return to international football, opening the scoring before second-half strikes from Harry Kane and Eberechi Eze sealed a second straight win.<\/p>\n
James told ITV Sport: \u201cIt\u2019s been a long time. I\u2019ve had a frustrating two-and-a-half years and I was so happy to get called up for my country again.<\/p>\n
\u201cI saw the wall and I felt I could bend it around, and thankfully I managed to hit the back of the net.\u201d<\/p>\n
James said the German has left his squad in no doubt about what he expects from them during the qualification process and beyond.<\/p>\n
\u201cHis ideas are clear, his goals and his targets,\u201d said James. \u201cHe set them out from the minute he came in, and we have one objective. It starts with this international and we have to keep on building right up to the World Cup.\u201d<\/p>\n
England captain Harry Kane also paid tribute to Tuchel, adding: \u201cHe\u2019s fantastic. I think he\u2019s settled in straight away, it\u2019s a real pleasure to have him as a coach \u2013 the energy he\u2019s brought, and the passion. I know we\u2019ll get better as we go on.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
England head coach Thomas Tuchel admitted Jude Bellingham was \u201clucky\u201d to escape a red card during his side\u2019s routine 3-0 World Cup qualifying win over Latvia at Wembley. Having already been booked in the first half, Bellingham looked fortunate to escape a second yellow for a mis-timed challenge on Raivis Jurkovskis shortly after the restart, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4277,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[173],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\n