‘The Daily Mail’s back page is an absolute disgrace. I know people will say to ignore it… but it’s simply embarrassing.’
The Daily Mail has been accused of “pure xenophobia” following the news that Thomas Tuchel is the new coach of the England men’s football team, having signed an 18-month contract. Rather than focusing on Tuchel’s managerial record, which saw him triumph in the 2021 Champions League with Chelsea after defeating Manchester City 1-0, the patriotic pro-Brexit press responded with outrage.
“A dark day for England,” declared the Mail‘s headline, followed by: “Three Lions gamble on a GERMAN… but Tuchel only has 18 months to prove he’s up to it.”
The Mail heaps praise on former England manager Gareth Southgate, despite having previously criticised him for apparently failing to capitalise on England’s potential. The right-wing newspaper describes Southgate as a figure who, may not have been “everyone’s cup of tea,” but he “wore the Three Lions on his shirt as a player and brought that force and pride into the job every day. He went from Euro 96 as a player to semi-finals and finals (two of them) as a manager. He was one of us.”
The tone of the article shifts sharply with the mention of Tuchel. “Now we have Thomas Tuchel,” it reads, “a German with a questionable managerial background and an FA running around like headless chickens in a panic to get in first before Manchester United.”
The paper questions if this is really the best option, comparing Tuchel to previous foreign managers Sven-Goran Eriksson and Fabio Capello, “And what does this say about the English coaching system? How insulting, ignorant and unforgivably short-sighted. Would Spain or France take this approach? We may have made an exception for the mighty Pep Guardiola, but now we have a gun for hire who owes us nothing and will pass through our game with a huge cheque and no connection to the fans or players. This is a dark day for English football. We are the laughing stock of the world game.”
Fortunately, readers saw the article for what it was.
“You‘d think this is a newspaper headline from 1948,” one reader posted.
“This Daily Mail’s back page is an absolute disgrace. I know people will say to ignore it… but it’s simply embarrassing. Putting the word “GERMAN” in capital letters; it’s 2024, this sort of utterly backwards bollocks should be well behind us,” posted the HLTCO Palace Podcast and Football Podcast.
Former footballer and broadcaster Stan Collymore didn’t beat around the bush, writing: “This is f*cking grim by the way. Pure xenophobia.”
Meanwhile, GB News predictably seized the opportunity to report about the backlash over the appointment, focusing on broadcaster and former FA head of communications Mike Parry, who expressed disbelief at the FA’s decision. The paper relished in citing that Parry fumed: “This is the third time the Football Association have done it. We had Sven-Goran Eriksson, then we had Fabio Capello who were useless. Capello never learnt to speak English.
“I had lunch with him once and we had to take an Italian journalist to interpret. And yet he was in charge of English players.”
In a separate piece, GB News featured Harry Redknapp’s criticism of the appointment, with Redknapp insisting that an English manager should have been chosen.
“I’m very patriotic, I think we should have an English manager but the field was very small to choose from because Englishmen don’t get jobs managing in the Premier League very often now,” said Rednapp.
It remains to be seen how the media will react if Tuchel chooses not to sing the national anthem. ‘Tongue-tied Tuchel,’ you can imagine the headlines already!
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