England’s international break is a mess before a ball’s been kicked – this wouldn’t have happened under Gareth Southgate

WHAT a mess England’s latest international break is before a ball has even been kicked.

Less than four months after contesting the Euro 2024 final, the Three Lions are struggling to put a decent team out for the important – yes, they are, actually – Nations League games against Greece and Ireland.

Of course, it is ridiculous that this is the third opportunity for a club versus country row already season.

Naturally, over-mighty clubs, mostly the same ones who were prepared to betray English football to set up a European Super League, are taking advantage.

But poor old Lee Carsley, his staff and the hordes of fans travelling to Athens for Thursday’s game really have been hung out to dry by the Football Association.

By appointing Thomas Tuchel last month but pandering to his desire not to actually start work until January, the Wembley bosses have made what would already have been a difficult situation much, much worse.

Putting the F and the A in farce since…well, for most of the last few decades.

But that is the point. Under Gareth Southgate, England stopped being a laughing stock on and off the pitch.

Pulling on the shirt became something players wanted to do again, a pleasure instead of the chore it had become across years of underachievement and bad feeling.

Fans and media reconnected with the national team. Everyone was in it together.

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That culture, years in the making, has been eroded in just a few short weeks.

Being manager of England no longer feels like the biggest honour our game can bestow on a coach – the sentiments that Carsley was expressing only a matter of days ago.

If Tuchel can opt in and out and decide which games matter, then why not the players and the clubs who ultimately call the shots?

Among the eight withdrawals, there will be genuine injuries which would make it unlikely or unwise for the individual to take part in either match.

Yet you can bet if Tuchel was even just going to show his face at St George’s Park this week, or attend Thursday’s game in Athens or Sunday’s at Wembley, some of them would have turned up.

You could argue that having Tuchel around if he wasn’t going to mastermind the actual matches, would have undermined Carsley.

What, any more than making the interim boss pretend he did not know that he was not going to get the job full-time and his successor had been chosen?

The point is, if Tuchel is serious about England and the FA are serious about Tuchel, he should be in charge right now.

If he and the FA find themselves having to contest Nations League play-off matches in March instead of World Cup qualifiers and/or top-level friendlies, they will only have themselves to blame.

And if the Tuchel/England experiment does not succeed overall – which, by the standards they have publicly laid down, means winning the 2026 World Cup – then they can expect pelters from the fans.

Supporters are paying large sums of money to go to Athens to watch what will be an under-strength team.

The next major tournament, being staged across four time zones and three countries, will be a major undertaking.

And most of the flags you will see in Mexico, Canada and the USA won’t bear the names of Liverpool, Chelsea, Arsenal or Manchester City, the sides who have had players pull out of Carsley’s squad.

The majority of the fans who cross the Atlantic will be proudly representing clubs like Luton, Colchester, Stoke and Chesterfield, as well as their country.

What a shame others don’t have the same commitment.