England Face Crucial World Cup Warm Ups Against Japan and Uruguay
England are amongst the favourites to win the 2026 World Cup Finals this coming summer, but Thomas Tuchel only has four games ahead of the finals to finalise his 23-man squad for the event.
Two of those fixtures come next weekend as the Three Lions face Asian and South American competition in the shape of Japan and Uruguay, two games that England will hope will give them some answers to key questions ahead of the final squad announcement which will be made at some point before Monday 1st June 2026.
While the results of these two games have no bearing on any competition, Tuchel will not want his England side to lose form in the build up to the event, even if the manager uses these games to try out players in specific roles or positions within the team.
Let’s take a look at the squad announced by Tuchel for these fixtures.
- V Uruguay (Friday 27th March – 7.45pm)
- V Japan (Tuesday 31st March – 7.45pm)
Both games will take place at Wembley Stadium.
England Squad
Tuchel announced the following 35-man squad for these two fixtures. Where he is looking for some degree of consistency, but also a chance to experiment with different players in key positions in the team.
Goalkeepers
- Dean Henderson (Crystal Palace)
- Jordan Pickford (Everton)
- James Trafford (Man City)
- Aaron Ramsdale (Newcastle Utd)
- Jason Steele (Brighton)
Defenders
- Dan Burn (Newcastle United)
- Marc Guehi (Man City)
- Lewis Hall (Newcastle United)
- Ezri Konsa (Aston Villa)
- Tino Livramento (Newcastle United)
- Harry Maguire (Manchester United)
- Nico O’Reilly (Man City)
- Jarell Quansah (Bayer Leverkusen)
- Djed Spence (Tottenham)
- John Stones (Man City)
- Fikayo Tomori (AC Milan)
Midfielders
- Elliot Anderson (Nottingham Forest)
- Jude Bellingham (Real Madrid)
- James Garner (Everton)
- Jordan Henderson (Brentford)
- Kobbie Mainoo (Manchester United)
- Declan Rice (Arsenal)
- Morgan Rogers (Aston Villa)
- Adam Wharton (Crystal Palace)
Attackers
- Jarrod Bowen (West Ham)
- Dominic Calvert-Lewin (Leeds United)
- Eberechi Eze (Arsenal)
- Phil Foden (Man City)
- Anthony Gordon (Newcastle United)
- Harry Kane (Bayern Munich)
- Noni Madueke (Arsenal)
- Cole Palmer (Chelsea)
- Marcus Rashford (Barcelona)
- Bukayo Saka (Arsenal)
- Dominic Solanke (Tottenham)
Omissions
A number of players didn’t make the squad. Amongst them were Trent Alexander-Arnold (Real Madrid), Danny Welbeck (Brighton), Morgan Gibbs-White (Nottingham Forest), Ivan Toney (Al Hilal), Alex Scott (Bournemouth) and Ollie Watkins (Aston Villa).
Luke Shaw and Reece James also missed the squad through injury.
There are now serious doubts that any of the players that were omitted from the 35-man squad for these two games, will be considered for the 23-man squad for the finals in the summer.
It should be noted that eleven of Tuchel’s squad will not feature against Uruguay after being given extra time to rest by Tuchel ahead of the game with Japan. That list includes players like Harry Kane, Declan Rice and Bukayo Saka who featured heavily in England’s qualifying campaign last year.
Team vs Uruguay?
With 11 regular starters for England missing for the Uruguay game, expect England to field a more experimental team for this game, with Tuchel likely to bring on many subs either at half time and/or throughout the second half to give game time to most in the squad.
For the game with Japan, I’d expect Tuchel to go back to his more favoured team selection featuring many of the players that didn’t feature against Uruguay,.
Looking at the squad and Tuchel’s preferred 4-2-3-1 formation, A possible team for the starting the game could be:
England Possible XI v Uruguay
- GK – Dean Henderson (Crystal Palace)
- DR – Tino Livramento (Newcastle)
- DL – Lewis Hall (Newcastle)
- DC – Harry Maguire (Man Utd)
- DC – Fikayo Tomori (AC Milan)
- DMC – Kobbie Mainoo (Man Utd)
- DMC – Adam Wharton (Crystal Palace)
- AMR – Phil Foden (Man City)
- AML – Jarrod Bowen (West Ham)
- AMC – Jude Bellingham (Real Madrid)
- AC – Marcus Rashford (Barcelona)
England Possible XI v Japan
- GK – Jordan Pickford (Everton)
- DR – Djed Spence (Tottenham)
- DL – Nico O’Reilly (Man City)
- DC – Marc Guehi (Man City)
- DC – Ezri Konsa (Aston Villa)
- DMC – Declan Rice (Arsenal)
- DMC – Elliot Anderson (Nottingham Forest)
- AMR – Bukayo Saka (Arsenal)
- AML – Anthony Gordon (Newcastle United)
- AMC – Morgan Rogers (Aston Villa)
- AC – Harry Kane (Bayern Munich)
With only the two warm up games against New Zealand (7th June) and Costa Rica (11th June) to go, which will feature the World Cup Finals squad, this is the last chance for players to force their way into Tuchel’s thinking ahead of the summer.
And for some, it already appears to be too late.
