Michael Carrick’s decision to reintegrate Kobbie Mainoo into Manchester United’s side has had an immediate national impact less than four months before the 2026 World Cup. The 20-year-old, who has not played for England since 2024, suddenly finds himself back in contention after a spell on the sidelines.<\/p>\n
Tuchel, linked by the FA’s recent agreement to remain England manager until after Euro 2028, has praised Mainoo’s return. \u201c[He is] absolutely back in the frame,\u201d the German coach told reporters. “It is great that he is back on the pitch. He is such a huge talent. He has played already a tournament from start to finish for England, so he is back in the picture.” Tuchel has yet to call on Mainoo for his England squads but his public endorsement changes the selection narrative.<\/p>\n
Mainoo’s fall from international involvement followed injuries and a period in which Amorim believed he was not right to start at club level. Darren Fletcher originally put Mainoo back into the United team and Carrick has continued that path. The midfielder’s quick recovery of form prompted Gary Lineker to joke that Mainoo ought to sue his former boss.<\/p>\n
Tuchel said Mainoo is not the only former United player returning to consideration, adding that Luke Shaw and Harry Maguire are also “back in the England picture.” He linked the shift to tactical changes at club level: \u201cThere are some players suddenly back in the picture, they play a back four now and play with a different style, which is a bit easier to translate to our structure at the moment,\u201d he explained. \u201cIt\u2019s good competition.\u201d<\/p>\n
The reversal is notable given that in October 2024 an England squad featured no Manchester United players for the first time since 1976. Mainoo had been selected by ex-manager Gareth Southgate but pulled out through injury, leaving no United representatives. To date the only United player Tuchel has selected is Marcus Rashford, who has been with other clubs on loan since last January and hardly counts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Mainoo’s quick return under Carrick has put him back in England contention before 2026 World Cup now<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6863,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[179,1348],"tags":[1021,1305,1087],"class_list":["post-6864","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-manchester-united","category-manchester-united-news","tag-amorim","tag-bench-selection","tag-coaching-change"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6864","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6864"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6864\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6863"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6864"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6864"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6864"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}