Now tell us what you really think, Thomas!

... Tuchel's interviews might be better than his games!

Now tell us what you really think, Thomas!

There is an unwritten charter in football that what’s said in the dressing-room stays in the dressing-room. Not in Thomas Tuchel’s dressing-room.

If Marcus Rashford and Phil Foden were expecting their first night reviews to be read to them in the form of a quiet word in their ears, they had another thing coming. Tuchel’s post-match tv interview delivered a verdict along the lines of Simon Cowell dissecting the audition of a tuneless boy band. It was a ‘no’ from him.

“We hope for more impact from these positions. More dribblings, less passes.” If either Rashford or Foden are given another chance against Latvia on Monday, we will all be counting their dribblings now. Tuchel says what’s on his mind.

It might come as a surprise to you and Roy Keane to learn that the graph that charts the size of an audience during a live football show indicates that most viewers turn on for the game and then off again at the final whistle. That may be about to change. Tuchel’s interviews were the most entertaining thing about England v Albania.

For that we have ITV to thank. Gabriel Clarke is easily the most accomplished reporter in television football. It wasn’t quite Frost and Nixon but there are early signs that Gabriel and Thomas have got a relationship brewing.

Too many of the interviewers that cross-examine managers and players in front of the brands that pay their wages have the air of a frothy quiz show host welcoming Tommy from Burton-upon-Trent for his chance to win a romantic weekend in the Cala Millor.

Clarke is more Ted Hastings than Ted Rogers. You need a solicitor present when you sit down with him.

His pre-match interview with Tuchel set the temperature gauge for the new manager’s style and approach. It was during this headline tete-a-tete that 8 years of diligent empire building by Sir Gareth Southgate were dismantled in one answer.

GC – Yes or no, did England have a clear playing style last summer?

TT - Not last summer, no.

GC – What was missing?

TT – The identity, the clarity, the rhythm, the repetition of patterns, the freedom of players, the expression of players, the hunger. They were more afraid to drop out of the tournament than having the excitement and hunger to win.

Is that all?!

Now, you can argue all you like about the validity, reality and lack of respect in Tuchel’s answer. And I would. There was an element of ‘Ask the Audience’ about it. It was what we all wanted to hear.

I’m more interested in how and why Clarke got that reply when no other interrogator did.

There is a distinct advantage in being granted a one-to-one ‘sit down’ interview with any subject. Massed press conferences don’t allow the same interaction or intimate access to the guy in the witness box. It was Clarke’s follow-up question that got the quotes that echoed around the media channels for the 24 hours leading up to kick-off.

Tuchel clearly enjoyed the flavour of the philosophical posers put to him.

GC - How would you define your relationship with football?

TT – Er, love

GC – What takes a team further? Talent or togetherness?

TT – At national level, togetherness. Be the best team-mate you can be.

GC – What best defines your personality as a coach?

TT – Intensity

Clarke’s searching questions were an upgrade on ‘will you sing the National Anthem?’

Many managers would have taken the Fifth Amendment and run a diplomatic mile away from probes into their very personality. ‘I’ll leave that for others to judge’ etc. Not Tuchel. His haunted features match his intensity. He’s rock’n’roll. Has anyone ever seen him in the same room as Michael Stipe?

He was visually framed and lit for the interview as if for a Mastermind final. I don’t know what was in the mug on the table next to Tuchel but Rashford and Foden could maybe do with a litre of it. He occasionally flashed a grin that teetered on the edge of smugness but only on the edge. Disarming and armed at the same time.

The frankness and the honesty will only survive the perils of England management if we let them. Too many viral sports stories in the modern media are about what someone said, rather than did. The moment we begin to round on Tuchel for his Teutonic certainty and throw his bold words back in his face, he will be within his rights to start storming out of interviews or turning mono-syllabic.

His English is excellent but it is his second language, a foreign culture. He needs to be given enough rope to climb in search of his lofty ambitions, not hang himself on them. Perhaps the short-term contract he’s signed comes with a free hit at delivering a short, sharp shock to the way we’ve always done things around here.

GC – What is the missing piece then?

TT – Excitement

GC – What do you mean?

TT – Excitement. The view that people feel that’s the team to beat… that we know already when we arrive (at the World Cup) that everyone knows this is the team to beat.

Everyone knows now alright. Thomas is not frightened to say it.