Declan Rice felt England delivered exactly what Thomas Tuchel demanded in their 3-0 victory over Costa Rica on Wednesday, revealing the manager insisted on far greater intensity from the squad. Rice opened the scoring within the first 10 minutes in Orlando, with Anthony Gordon converting a penalty in the second half and substitute Ollie Watkins heading home a third late on.
The dominant performance against a limited Costa Rica side keeps England on course for their World Cup opener against Croatia on Wednesday. The display marked a significant improvement from the low-key 1-0 win over New Zealand on Saturday, and Rice confirmed that was precisely what Tuchel had asked for.
Tuchel's pre-match demand
“The manager was onto us before the game to ramp it up,” the Arsenal midfielder told ITV. “Intensity with the ball, counter-pressing and I thought the performance tonight was top from everyone. Even the boys that came off the bench, it was outstanding in the second half. Really good last game before it all starts.”
Rice was highly positive about the team’s growing cohesion, highlighting the link-up play with Gordon and Nico O’Reilly as an encouraging sign. “I think we’ve adapted, you can see the heat’s not really a problem now. I think the first week or 10 days has been adapting to the heat,” he said. “Playing with him [Gordon] and Nico, we’ve been speaking all week about how we’re going to rotate and be fluid, and you’ve seen that in the first half. As a group we’re building confidence and building fitness going into the first game. We’ve got more training sessions, we’re going to keep building and it’s really good.”
Tuchel's satisfaction
Tuchel was equally thrilled with the performance and result, indicating he received exactly what he had requested from his players. “We did very well, we deserved to win, we should have had more goals,” the manager said. “We could easily have scored more, created a lot but the attitude, the energy and the intensity was on a very high level. Everyone did well, it’s not about one individual player today, it was a very good team performance. We wanted to have this push to the next level and we clearly got it. Everyone in the stadium could feel it. We did a lot for it, we worked hard, counter-pressing was good, defending, attitude, togetherness. Everything on a very, very high level.”
Certain positions in Tuchel’s team remain undecided, such as left wing between Gordon and Marcus Rashford and the number 10 role between Jude Bellingham and Morgan Rogers. However, the boss insisted Wednesday night did not settle anything for him. “No. Tonight just makes my mind very calm because we’re on absolutely the right way,” he said. “I’m very proud of what I saw today from the team spirit and behaviour. The guys who came in were super influential. The guys who came out were pushing from behind on the bench. Exactly what we wanted.”
Asked if he now knows his starting XI for the Croatia match, Tuchel replied: “No. I will now find XI for tomorrow’s game and then I have another six days. Today was exactly what we wished for and exactly what we wanted.”
The win over Costa Rica was the final official friendly before the campaign begins, but England have another behind-closed-doors contest on Thursday against Miami United, giving Tuchel’s players one more chance to impress.
