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LONDON: England head coach Thomas Tuchel has never been slow to speak his mind and the German turned his ire on the Wembley fans on Thursday, criticizing the home supporters for being too quiet in a comfortable 3-0 friendly win against Wales.
The mood was buoyant enough as goals by Morgan Rogers, Ollie Watkins and Bukayo Saka in the opening 20 minutes made England’s eighth successive win over the Welsh a formality.
With the game petering out in the second half, many England fans opted to leave early, some launched paper aeroplanes and it was only the loud away contingent who created any noise.
“We had one-and-a-half training days to prepare against a well-trained team and we did very well,” Tuchel said. “We had an excellent first half, we were 3-0 up very quickly, but we could have been 4-0 up at halftime.
“Then we couldn’t score, the fourth one, the fifth one, the stadium was silent, we never got any energy back from the fans. I think the players delivered a lot to get more from the stands.
“What more can you give them? Twenty minutes, three goals, and the way we attacked Wales, and they didn’t let them escape, even from their own half, and it was ball-win after ball-win.
“If you’re here for half an hour, it’s just Wales fans. Yeah, so a bit sad. The team deserved big support today.”
In his press conference later Tuchel said he had no doubt that England’s support in Latvia on Tuesday, when a win could seal their place at next year’s World Cup, will be louder.
“I’m 100 percent sure that we will have fantastic support in the (World Cup) and we will have top support in Latvia. We had excellent support in Serbia,” he said.
“But today we were 3-0 up and I was like ‘why is the roof still on?’ It’s nothing big. It was just like it could have helped us also in the second half, in some moments, to regain energy and to regain a rhythm.”
Tuchel left out Jude Bellingham, Phil Foden and Jack Grealish from his squad, while captain Harry Kane, Noni Madueke and Reece James were missing from the team that beat Serbia 5-0 last month because of injury.
But the German said his loyalty to the players he used in last month’s wins had been rewarded.
“The team’s pushing itself, they buy into the idea, and they love the idea of going after opponents,” Tuchel, who has won six of his first seven matches in charge, said.
“At the moment, it’s very intense, it’s very demanding, but it’s very effective. I’m very delighted with the last two matches. We are absolutely on the right way and on the side it feels like we show very good behavior, even like a club team.
“This is the feeling that we want to create. And like I said, the competition is on, and you can feel it. The guys who play are happy to play. They want to keep their shirts.” 

BIR EL DJIR, Algeria: Algeria have become the fourth African country to qualify for the 2026 World Cup — and all of them are from the north of the continent.
A 3-0 win over Somalia on Thursday guaranteed Algeria first place in Group G in African qualifying with a match to spare and a return to the World Cup for the first time since 2014.
Algeria, captained by Riyad Mahrez and led by former Switzerland coach Vladimir Petkovic, joined neighboring nations Morocco and Tunisia as well as Mohamed Salah’s Egypt in securing a spot in next year’s expanded 48-team tournament being held in the United States, Canada and Mexico.

It will be the fifth time for the Algerians at the World Cup — and they’ve only ever progressed from the group stage once, in 2014 when they lost to Germany in the round of 16.
A total of nine African teams will directly qualify and be in the World Cup tournament draw taking place on Dec. 5 in Washington D.C.
The other five group winners will be known over the next week. The four best runners-up play in a knockout competition in November, and the winner advances to the playoffs.
Mahrez stars
Despite being a home game for Somalia, it was staged at the Miloud Hadefi Olympic Complex in Algeria and the fans were treated to a show by Mahrez — the team’s star winger who used to play for Manchester City and now is at Al-Ahli in ����ֱ��.

The 34-year-old Mahrez set up goals for Mohamed Amoura in the sixth and 58th minutes, either side of scoring himself with a fierce strike into the roof of the net in the 19th.
Mahrez started his international career weeks before the 2014 World Cup, and was included in Algeria’s squad for the tournament, only playing in their first group game.
Fight for second
Uganda stayed in second place in the group — four points behind Algeria — after beating Botswana 1-0 and moved three points clear of Mozambique, which lost 2-1 at home to Guinea.
In the final round of matches, Uganda travel to Algeria and Mozambique play Somalia.
Morocco the benchmark
All the African teams heading to the World Cup will look to repeat the exploits of Morocco, which became the first team from the continent to reach the semifinals in the 2022 tournament in Qatar.