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England's Tuchel plays down records before final World Cup qualifier / Photo: © AFP
NYSE - LSE
England's Tuchel plays down records before final World Cup qualifier
Thomas Tuchel said records are not on his mind as he prepares England for their final World Cup qualifier against Albania on Sunday to round off a remarkable campaign.
The German began his reign with a 2-0 win against Albania at Wembley in March and ends his first year in charge against the same opponents in Tirana.
England, who qualified for next year's World Cup in Canada, Mexico and the United States last month, have won all seven games so far in Group K without conceding a single goal -- an impressive record that opposition manager Sylvinho joked was "disgusting".
On Sunday they can become the first European side to play at least six World Cup qualifiers and win them all without conceding, but that is not on Tuchel's radar.
"We didn't speak a single word about that," he told reporters on Saturday.
"We made sure yesterday that we had the training session that we had. The quality and the mentality of the guys that didn't play was on the highest level, which was a pure pleasure.
"It just showed me that we are going in the right way.
"Everyone is ready to play, everyone is ready to start. Competition is still on, the hunger is still on."
England arrived in Albania with a 23-man squad after Ezri Konsa withdrew from the camp with a calf complaint.
It means there will be at least one change from Thursday's 2-0 win against Serbia, when Jude Bellingham, Eberechi Eze and Phil Foden impressed off the bench.
Captain Harry Kane is confident all the players are on the same page as Tuchel seeks to forge a genuine feeling of "brotherhood".
Kane feels it is an ethos that everyone is buying into despite the manager's willingness to leave out big-name players.
"I think everyone feels ready to be part of it, they want to come and show what they can do in training and games," he said.
"They want to obviously show the boss that they deserve to be picked for next summer."
The skipper added: "We probably have a handful of training sessions from now until then, so even players like Marc (Guehi) turning up this camp, even though he was injured, to kind of be around it.
"I think it is really important, because we haven't got a lot of time to get all the messages across from now until until the summer, and from that point of view, I think it's been fantastic."
S.Mazur--GL
