Nicky Butt Calls for Mainoo to Snub Third-Place Play-Off and Tuchel's Exit

Nicky Butt has lit a fuse under England’s bruised World Cup campaign, urging Kobbie Mainoo to refuse a late call into the starting XI and demanding that Thomas Tuchel is removed as head coach after the semi-final defeat to Argentina.

The former Manchester United midfielder did not hold back. In his view, Mainoo should not even entertain the idea of playing in Saturday night’s third-place decider against France.

‘I’d just refuse to play’

Mainoo forced his way into Tuchel’s final squad on the back of a superb second half of the season at Old Trafford, flourishing once Michael Carrick took interim charge. He arrived at the World Cup as one of the most talked‑about young midfielders in Europe.

He leaves it, barring a late cameo, without a single minute on the pitch.

Tuchel has kept the 21-year-old rooted to the bench throughout England’s run, including the heartbreaking semi-final loss to Argentina on Wednesday. Now, with the pressure off and changes expected for the France game, Mainoo is suddenly in line to start.

Butt’s verdict on that prospect was scathing.

“I do not know what is going on there, there’s something not quite right with it,” he said. “Now they’re going to play the bomb squad in the stupid third-place game.

“I’d just refuse to play if I was Kobbie Mainoo. I’d say I was injured. It’s a nonsense game, especially when you’ve been treated like that.

“He’s not played a minute of football, now to go and start this pointless jumped-up friendly and potentially get injured for the whole season… no.”

For Butt, the principle matters. A young player, overlooked when it counts, should not be wheeled out when the stakes have vanished and the risk remains the same.

‘No way he can stay on’

His criticism did not stop with team selection. Butt turned his fire fully on Tuchel and the Football Association, insisting the German cannot survive the fallout from the semi-final defeat.

“There’s no way he [Tuchel] can stay on. Not a cat in hell’s chance after that,” Butt said. “If he stays on, John McDermott [the FA’s technical director] needs to be sacked as well.

“There’s no way you can keep him now. He’s not a Sir Bobby Robson or Kevin Keegan, someone that the nation loves.

“You’re talking about a manager that’s come in and played negative football, crazy negative football, in the semi-final against a beatable Argentina team.”

The manner of the exit, not just the result, clearly rankles. Butt painted a picture of an England side shackled by caution on a night when he felt the opposition were there to be taken.

“And it shouldn’t really matter, but people will go against him because he’s German as well, so he’s going to have a nightmare.

“He’s an unbelievable club manager, so just let him go. He won’t want to stay. He might say he does, but deep down he’ll be thinking, ‘pay up, I’m out of here’.”

Howe, Pochettino… and the one that got away

Butt even sketched out what comes next. One name is out of reach, at least for now. Others, he believes, are ready.

“If we were nine months down the line, I’d definitely be going for Pep Guardiola. But Pep can’t leave Man City a month ago, saying he needs a rest from football, and then go straight back in. He can’t do that.”

With Guardiola effectively ruled out in the short term, Butt turned to two candidates he sees as better suited to the international stage than Tuchel.

“Eddie Howe would be brilliant. I’d love him to go in, it’d be great.

“Mauricio Pochettino’s got an unbelievable relationship with John McDermott. When McDermott was the academy manager at Tottenham, Pochettino was the manager, and they had a really, really good relationship.

“I was in and around it with the Manchester United academy, we would do training camps there so I’ve seen it first hand.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if that happened and I wouldn’t be against it at all. He’s a very, very good manager. A likeable person, plays good football everywhere he goes.”

Then came the sting. England thought they had that kind of manager already.

“But we all said the same about Tuchel, yet when they go into that England dynamic, they just change, it’s crazy. I can’t put my finger on why.”

As England prepare for a third-place game Butt dismisses as a “pointless jumped-up friendly”, the questions he has thrown into the air will not wait for the final whistle. The next decision the FA makes – on Mainoo’s treatment, on Tuchel’s future, on who leads this group into the next cycle – will say far more about England’s direction than anything that happens against France on Saturday night.