The England team are set to kick off their World Cup campaign in Dallas. Will they beat Croatia and put themselves in good standing for finally bringing it home, after 60 years of hurt? Frankly, that matter has paled into insignificance compared to the real burning question of the tournament: what the heck was the photographer saying to the Three Lions when they were posing for their official pictures?
The photoshoot, which featured solo shots of all 26 squad members plus their manager Thomas Tuchel, was captured by the American snapper Carmen Mandato, who has somehow found a way to elicit some poses for the ages from the lads. Gone for the most part are the classic shoulders back, chin-up stances of yore. In their place is something far more, well, creative. Intriguing, even.
And so while there are a few predictable postures in the set of photos released by Fifa – Ollie Watkins has been called upon to do the tried and tested, finger-on-lips “ssh!”, while Jordan Pickford makes his gloves the main event, as goalkeepers are wont to do – the majority, however, are absolute wild cards.
The overall vibe feels a bit like a very high-end sixth-form art project – as if the person behind the camera has recruited a bunch of recalcitrant mates to do “edgy” editorial poses that they’re not quite convinced by. Is it part of an image overhaul to distance the squad from their happy clappy Southgate days? Is Tuchel attempting to bring a bit of German avant garde to proceedings? Did they think the photos on those ubiquitous Marks & Spencer football stickers were a bit too cookie-cutter?
Perhaps the most memed image so far has been the portrait of soon-to-be Barcelona player Anthony Gordon, whose tumbling hair, blue eyes and tilted head make him a dead ringer for Princess Diana. Throw on a bit of eyeliner and he would be ready to confess to the nation that there were three people in this marriage, or strut through Kensington Gardens in a full revenge kit.
It’s not the first time that Gordon has been compared to the people’s princess – his choppy hairstyle, reminiscent of a post-divorce Di, and fondness for a hairband have already been noted – so you have to wonder whether he and the photographer were trolling us.
And then there’s Reece James, his shoulders braced and his arms held awkwardly by his sides, like a computer game character from The Sims awaiting instructions from the player – or, as various social media users have pointed out, like a small boy posing for a photo on his first day of school so that his mum can send it out to the family WhatsApp group (“Look how much he’s grown!”)
With his dead-eyed stare, back-up goalkeeper Dean Henderson looks like a man who has seen things, terrible things that he will take to the grave; meanwhile, Harry Kane has struck the sort of pose best summed up as “man on Hinge attempting to look soulful”. Henderson’s fellow goalie James Trafford gazes morosely down at his gloves, as if he is about to deliver Lady Macbeth’s “will these hands ne’er be clean?” monologue, while with his hands on his hips, Morgan Rogers looks a bit like he’s about to tell you that he’s not angry, just disappointed. As for the rest of the lads? Most of them are grabbing their necks in ways that look downright painful – almost as painful as Declan Rice’s sunburn.
After that brief foray into weirdness, though, things seem to have settled down for the official group photo unveiled this week. In this latest photoshoot, the art school poses have been cast aside in favour of more conventional poses, albeit with the customary dash of awkwardness (is that a smile or a grimace, John Stones?).
This time, it’s as if “approachable lads” were scrawled on the mood board beforehand. Instead of being decked out in suits and ties, the boys are dressed in smart casual pieces in navy and cream from FA partner Marks & Spencer. On their feet are loafers, rather than the usual lace-ups.
Celebrity stylist Alex Longmore has told the BBC that it’s a “very Tom Ford, very Bond look”, but I can’t help but feel like that is a bit of a stretch. Looking at the photo, I’m reminded of the moment when the Love Island lads have to dress up for a staged night out and stand around sheepishly as they’ve never worn a pair of long trousers before. But I suppose that’s part of what makes it endearing.
And for their day-to-day look when they’re travelling from fixture to fixture? The boys have been given an entirely different aesthetic identity, decked out in tracksuits in a slightly putrid shade of baby blue.
The Times’s fashion director Anna Murphy was less than impressed when she delivered her verdict earlier this month; she hailed the design as “a monstrosity” and noted that the plasticky-looking finish of the fabrics means that we might all need “to pray that Harry Kane et al don’t stand near a naked flame”. England’s match boots may have been briefly nabbed from a team vehicle during transportation, but I’m not exactly surprised that the thieves didn’t bother trying to spirit away these trackies.
The England team tend to get their image-making right when they’re not trying too hard. Remember that joyful picture of a baby-faced Bukayo Saka larking around in the pool on an inflatable unicorn during the Euro 2020 campaign? Right now, though, these wildly different aesthetics suggest a bit of an off-pitch identity crisis. I just hope it doesn’t translate into their tactics…
