One of Thomas Tuchel’s favourite analogies when it comes to the development of his England team is that of a train leaving a station with only the chosen few on it. As time moves on, the bodies lying on the tracks are growing greater in number. 

Consider this statistic. Of the 26 players who travelled to the World Cup in America 13 are not in the squad chosen by England manager Tuchel for next week’s Nations League games against Croatia and Spain. And that does not include Cole Palmer and Phil Foden who, after missing out in the summer, were expected by many of us to have forced a way back in by now. 

Tuchel’s latest selection has been affected by injuries, of course. But more significant is that the experienced German believes he is now starting to see an England team and squad develop in a way and in a direction that even he hadn’t envisaged once Argentina ended his World Cup hopes in that dismal Atlanta semi-final in July.

Different feelings, different style of play and, to a degree, different players.

Some are calling this ‘Tuchel 2.0’ and it does feel a little bit like that. The start of the second phase of Tuchel’s tenure, the start of the road towards a tilt at another trophy, the European Championships of 2028.

Having admitted to some worry ahead of the four-game international break FIFA saddled us all with last month, Tuchel sat down yesterday looking and sounding like a man once again certain of himself.

Certain enough of a direct, quick, athletic style of play that helped England to two wins over Czech Republic and one – by seven goals – against Croatia in Rijeka. And certain that a dependence on players like Jordan Henderson, Dan Burn and John Stones for what we may politely call ‘squad culture management’ lies now in the past.

All of this may crash down in Madrid next Sunday. Spain have already beaten Tuchel’s England once – at Wembley in late September – and a repeat this month would ask familiar questions about England against the really good teams.

But for now, Tuchel is confident enough to claim that he has found his path.

‘We said at some point we need to take the next step, to build on what we have, to get better and to improve otherwise you’re just left behind,’ said Tuchel yesterday.

‘That’s how football works. You have been champion in one season but you need to improve, you need to bring in new players for competition, young players, new energy, fresh energy. It’s also the way, naturally, the national team goes.

‘We cannot be stuck in the same personnel and in the same style of play.

‘I agreed with you last month. I was the first to admit I was not 100 per cent happy with the pure level of football we played in the US. I saw a higher level in training [than on the field], I saw a higher level in glimpses.

‘We adjusted some things tactically, created some new positions and took the next steps.’

The Tuchel we sat down with in late September still wore the scars of the summer’s disappointment – and the criticism that came with it – rather visibly. It was the first time we had seen him like that in his two years in the job. He was tetchy and easily provoked. Call it the Argentina effect if you like.

Here, he appeared rather healed. Good results tend to do that for a manager and a little time helps too. If he believes his team has moved on then maybe he has also and he had to.

Certainly, his selection squad speaks to that. The inclusion of Jobe Bellingham – Jude’s younger brother – was the headline act but there were other messages written within.

Henderson and Burn are available but not included. So too Arsenal’s Noni Madueke, excluded to the benefit of the more direct Liverpool winger Rio Ngumoha.

‘We need runners who will go between the lines,’ said Tuchel. A clear indication, there, that too much of England’s summer wing play was too slow and too conservatively narrow.

Palmer, Foden and Kobbie Mainoo are also on the outside looking in once again and the case of the Manchester United midfielder is perhaps indicative of how Tuchel now operates.

Moved to apologise to him in front of the whole squad in July for his lack of minutes at the World Cup, Tuchel was determined Mainoo would play in the opening four games of the Nations League campaign.

‘I was desperate to give him the minutes and desperate to include him in this new start,’ explained Tuchel.

‘But then he pulled out. He missed an excellent camp and also entered a difficult, difficult spell for himself.

‘Man United fell off a cliff a little bit performance-wise. So this is why he now suffers.’

We can talk about the whys and wherefores of that logic. If Mainoo was good enough in September then why is he not good enough now? How desperate could Tuchel really have been to play him that one withdrawal with injury closed the door for the next camp and opened it instead for Bellingham jnr?

This, though, is how Tuchel works. He is an adept tactician but he’s also a mood coach, someone who – after sobering club experiences at places like PSG, Chelsea and Bayern Munich – places huge emphasis on environments and gut feels and culture. If he feels something works, he doesn’t like to pick it apart without good reason.

This is why for example the growing voice and influence of Elliot Anderson has left Jordan Henderson suddenly surplus. Tuchel says the door is not closed on a player who will be 38 by the time the next Euros are played and he called him this week to say so. In Tuchel’s mind, though, England will now move without the veteran and others of his ilk.

‘I was concerned before the last camp that we missed the players who kept our standards,’ said Tuchel.

‘I was worried that we missed so many of them. But then this group found their own way and their own voices.

‘I know what the others did. They built a platform on which these ones can build.’

Time will tell. To a degree, Spain will tell. Can England play the kind of higher tempo, front foot football we saw against Croatia and the Czechs against the world and European champions next Sunday? They embarrassed us when we didn’t have the ball at Wembley.

It’s also reasonable to ask why our head coach can’t find room in his squad – if not his team – for the game-changing duo of Palmer and Foden. England lacked good substitutes at the World Cup. There was too much like for like. 

England need to win in order for such decisions to be vindicated and Tuchel knows that.

Asked yesterday if he felt as invigorated as he looked he said he did. ‘The last camp gave me a lot of energy, gave me a lot of extra belief,’ he said.

‘It gave me a lot of optimism to not compromise on the way England teams should play. Be physical but also step up in the pure level of performances.’

It’s certainly time for this now. The summer only served to expose English shortcomings. Tuchel’s train must arrive in Madrid next weekend, not only with fresh personnel but also new ideas clearly apparent. 

Read more: Thomas Tuchel admits his relationship with Jude Bellingham is 'up and down' – but on the mend – as he reveals he's apologised to Kobbie Mainoo who is struggling at 'off a cliff' Man United