Gary Lineker and Alan Shearer have same suspicion about England's Thomas Tuchel deal
Gary Lineker and Alan Shearer have agreed on why the FA accelerated talks with Thomas Tuchel, who will succeed Gareth Southgate as England head coach
Gary Lineker and Alan Shearer suspect Manchester United motivated the FA to move so quickly to appoint Thomas Tuchel as England boss.
The former Chelsea chief is set to be confirmed as Gareth Southgate ’s success after it emerged the FA have been in advanced talks with the 51-year-old, who is out of work after leaving Bayern Munich, with negotiations progressing rapidly. Tuchel is believed to have agreed an 18-month contract beginning on January 1.
He will become the third non-Englishman to hold the post full-time after Sven-Goran Eriksson and Fabio Capello. The news ends Tuchel’s continued links with the Man United. The German coach held talks in the summer as United weighed up whether to stick with Erik ten Hag.
Terms could not be agreed and Ten Hag was eventually kept on and given a contract extension. However, United’s dismal start to the season has led to speculation Tuchel could replace the under-fire Dutchman after all.
Former England strikers Lineker and Shearer reckon that led to FA striking a deal so quickly with the ex-Borussia Dortmund and PSG boss. Speaking on The Rest is Football podcast, Shearer said: “They’ve looked at Thomas Tuchel and thought there’s a real live chance he’ll get the Man United job pretty soon. So their opportunity lies now.
“If they didn’t act quickly now, they weren’t going to get one of the outstanding candidates because there’s every chance that vacancy [at United] could become available soon.”
Lineker has the same suspicion, adding: “Obviously there was a big meeting at Manchester United in London with Jim Ratcliffe and all the various people that are involved. There was a lot of rumour that they were going to fire Erik ten Hag. Maybe they weren’t, I don’t know, I have no inside information on that.
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“But we know they [United] went for Tuchel in the summer, it didn’t happen. Maybe they were thinking again.
“And maybe the FA have gone, ‘crickey, we don’t want to miss out to Manchester United’. It may have pushed them, but it seems slightly odd, the timing, because he isn’t going to start the job until the beginning of the year. Also, with Lee Carsley in charge, he’s been told he’s going to get three camps, and he’s still going to get three camps.”
Lineker would have given the job to Carsley, who has overseen England’s four Nations League games this season and will get two more in charge before handing the reins to Tuchel. The Match of the Day host said: “I’ve seen enough to suggest to me that the players really trust him, that’s he's imaginative enough to produce something that is a joy to watch, is entertaining, that is front-foot football.
“I would have gone for Lee Carsley. I really liked him but I could tell he knew he wasn’t getting the job between his first camp and sometime before the Greece game.
“I would have done that [given Carsley the job] because I’ve looked at the recent history of international football. The winners of the last two major tournaments [Lionel Scaloni with Argentina and Luis de la Fuente with Spain] had no real experience coaching outside the national setup.”
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