GLEE LIONS

Carsley's smiling assassins show Tuchel the fun way forward

- by JOHN CROSS

THOMAS TUCHEL finally realised his dream of seeing an England team winning with a smile.

The Three Lions boss spent the beginning of June begging for his senior squad to stop playing with fear.

He got a taste of what that could look like in Slovakia on Saturday night as the Under-21s showed they are England's real Golden Generation. Lee Carsley has built a winning environment which can, and should, be taken into Tuchel's senior set-up.

Now it has to be about who can make the step up into the seniors to bring with them that winning mentality which, arguably, is the most important ingredient in tournament football.

There are no guarantees for England's latest generation of Under-21s, who defeated Germany in a thriller which saw 3.7m tune in on Channel 4.