Reputation counts for nothing with Thomas Tuchel! Winners and losers as England boss leaves game-changers Cole Palmer and Phil Foden out of World Cup squad while Ivan Toney receives shock call-up

When the World Cup gets underway on June 11 it will be a year and a day since Ivan Toney's last England cap - a two-minute cameo in the alarming friendly defeat to Senegal at Nottingham Forest's City Ground. Even more incredibly, he hadn't been included in a squad since - and yet, 12 months on, Tuchel has suddenly pivoted back to the 30-year-old Al-Ahli striker to be one of his back-up options to captain Harry Kane - at a World Cup, no less.

Ultimately, it seems, a 40-plus-goal season in Saudi Arabia has proven to be too good to ignore (even though the manager had done exactly that for the past year!), while Toney has also argued that he will be better prepared for the blistering heat in North America than many others.

There was always going to be at least one big call to be made in the No.10 position as Tuchel chose between a clutch of supremely talented attacking midfielders. Morgan Rogers' place was all-but guaranteed, while the versatile Jude Bellingham was also a shoo-in, leaving the manager to take his pick from Eberechi Eze, Cole Palmer, Phil Foden and Morgan Gibbs-White.

Despite being the most in-form option, it had long been reported that Gibbs-White was an outsider, so his exclusion isn't all that surprising - but leaving out both Palmer and Foden is a seismic decision that sent shockwaves through social media as fans were left in disbelief.

In truth, though, neither can have many complaints: Palmer's season has been hampered by injuries, he has barely played for England since Euro 2024 and he is only just starting to look something like the player who took the Premier League by storm in his first two seasons with Chelsea, while Foden has been badly out of sorts for club and country for some time, dating back to the Euros two years ago, when he was ineffective and there were widespread calls for him to be dropped. Eze, then, is the sole survivor at the end of a solid but inconsistent debut campaign with Arsenal.

There will be question marks over the contentious calls to leave out Gibbs-White, Palmer and Foden, with all of them surely more capable of making an impact off the bench than a number of players who have made the cut. But when discussing the attacking midfielders he had overlooked, Tuchel said: "We tried to have a balanced squad and not to bring five No.10s and make them play out of position. Because whom would we do a favour with that? The player? Ourselves? I don't think so."

Kobbie Mainoo's chances of making England's World Cup squad looked dead in the water midway through the season. He was completely disregarded by former Manchester United boss Ruben Amorim, who stood stubbornly by his belief that the midfielder was an ill fit for his back-three system. Having considered a January exit, Mainoo will be mightily grateful that he outlasted the Portuguese tactician at Old Trafford.

The 21-year-old academy graduate went straight back into the United team under interim head coach Michael Carrick, earning a new contract with his assured displays as he helped his boyhood club return to the Champions League in a resurgent second half of the campaign.

He's now won the battle with Adam Wharton and James Garner to claim the final central midfield spot in Tuchel's squad, even if he is unlikely to start ahead of either Declan Rice or Elliot Anderson.

The writing had long been on the wall for Trent Alexander-Arnold, but that will make his omission no less painful - especially given that injuries had seemingly opened the door for him. Tuchel, though, snubbed the Real Madrid right-back yet again by instead opting to include Tottenham's Djed Spence, which follows the telling decision to leave Alexander-Arnold out of his bumper 35-man squad for the March international window.

This is a bitter end to a disappointing debut season in Madrid for the 27-year-old, who had joined Los Blancos from Liverpool in a bid to enter the Ballon d'Or conversation. After this latest rejection - which comes despite the fact that Ben White is injured and Tino Livramento will have only just recovered from his own fitness problem - his international future is in doubt, certainly as long as Tuchel is in charge, as he hasn't played for his country for close to a year.

From the manager's perspective, it's another big call that will draw serious scrutiny, given what Trent could offer from offensive perspective against a low block with his unrivalled range of passing, but it seems his defensive deficiencies have cost him dearly once again.

There is one club manager who will be quietly pleased by some of Tuchel's biggest selection calls, and that is new Chelsea boss Xabi Alonso. The Spaniard begins work at Cobham on July 1 and will unexpectedly have a full pre-season with all-but-one of his English contingent.

Reece James is the only Chelsea representative included in England's World Cup squad, with Palmer overlooked alongside Levi Colwill and outsider Trevoh Chalobah. That's a boost for Alonso, especially given Palmer's injury problems this season, while Colwill has only just returned to action after missing most of the season with an ACL tear.

After Joao Pedro, Andrey Santos and Estevao were all snubbed by Brazil boss Carlo Ancelotti, the Blues will likely only have James, Marc Cucurella, Jorrel Hato, Enzo Fernandez, Moises Caicedo, Pedro Neto and Nicolas Jackson going to the World Cup.

It's clear Harry Maguire believed he was a shoo-in for the World Cup after his recall to the England squad for the last international break amid his resurgence during the second half of Manchester United's season. Tuchel, though, had other ideas.

The centre-back has been axed by the German, who, in fairness, had admitted in March that Maguire was still well down the pecking order and that he "hadn't changed his mind" on the old-school centre-back. Some reports suggest the player's ego was a concern, in that he wouldn't settle for being a back-up player, while others claimed his ability to play out from the back was a cause for concern in Tuchel's eyes.

Maguire - and some of his family - lashed out against the decision the day before the squad was officially announced - perhaps confirming some of Tuchel's doubts about his suitability for this particular group. "I was confident I could have played a major part this summer for my country after the season I've had," he posted on social media. "I've been left shocked and gutted by the decision."

What a season it's been for Nico O'Reilly! The 21-year-old has been England's breakout star of the 2025-26, chipping in with a ridiculous 15 goal involvements from the left side of Manchester City's defence, and he looks set to cap a fine individual campaign by heading to the World Cup as his country's starting left-back.

Lewis Hall and Myles Lewis-Skelly were both shock omissions from the squad, with Tuchel expected to select at least one of them to compete with O'Reilly for the left full-back role. However, the City man is now clear to make the position his own, with Djed Spence likely to play back-up.

There is some risk attached to the decision, given O'Reilly is actually a midfielder by trade; that means there is no recognised, out-and-out left-back in the squad, with Spence more comfortable on the opposite flank. Tuchel is clearly confident, though, that the gamble will pay off.

From the moment he walked through the door as the new England manager, Tuchel has made it abundantly clear that he was more than willing to make unpopular choices if they led him to building a team in his own vision that he believes is capable of winning a World Cup - but has he gone too far this time?

With hindsight, Tuchel could become the biggest winner of this squad selection, but if England's campaign is a failure - which, in reality, means anything less than reaching the semi-finals - then fans and pundits alike will look back on the confirmation of the 26-man group as the moment that things started to go wrong.

In his defence, the core of key players that form the strongest starting XI is there, but there are huge concerns over the lack of depth beyond that in the absence of Jarrod Bowen, Palmer, Alexander-Arnold, Gibbs-White, Wharton and Maguire - all of whom would have had the potential to make a significant impact off the bench. The likes of Jordan Henderson, Spence, and Noni Madueke simply do not inspire as much confidence.

This squad does, at least, avoid the distraction of the fierce debates that have raged around the camp in previous tournaments. The strongest starting line-up is clear - bar the No.10 role where Bellingham and Rogers may well job-share. Tuchel referenced "clarity" upon confirming his squad, and his selections mean there will be no clamour for Palmer to start, no calls for Foden to be dropped and no questions over where Alexander-Arnold is playing - which could ultimately be invaluable.

However, the only certainty right now is that this squad selection is likely to define Tuchel's tenure.