Thomas Tuchel relishing the fierce competition for places in his England squad | OneFootball

England boss Thomas Tuchel is relishing the difficult decisions after opting to leave Trent Alexander-Arnold, Jack Grealish, Phil Foden and Kyle Walker out of his latest squad.

The quartet have been omitted from Tuchel’s 24-man squad for forthcoming World Cup qualifiers against Andorra and Serbia in an eyebrow-raising selection.

Nottingham Forest midfielder Elliot Anderson and Tottenham full-back Djed Spence were given maiden call-ups, with Adam Wharton selected by Tuchel for the first time and Tino Livramento returning from Under-21s duty.

The German, whose mission is to win the World Cup in the United States next summer, does not enjoy telling players they are not in the squad, but is enamoured by the fierce competition for places.

He said: “These are the decisions. There had to be some difficult calls.

“You wanted to do it because we wanted a tighter squad, more competition.

“I kind of like it. The competition is on. I don’t like the phone calls, but I kind of like them, because it just shows we have players pushing and we have players fighting for the squad.

“That’s exactly what we want.”

Alexander-Arnold’s omission is perhaps the most the notable, with the Real Madrid right-back behind Chelsea captain Reece James and Newcastle’s Tino Livarmento in the pecking order.

But Tuchel said both he and Grealish remain in the mix for selection.

“First of all, we decided for a tighter squad, for a bit more competitive squad,” the German added.

“There is no doubt that I’m a big fan of Trent and Jack because of their talent and not their personalities. They are big players.

“They will always be big players, and they will always be in the mix to be called up.

“I know that both of them are desperate to come back, which is really important.

“But for this camp, we decided for Trent’s position for Reece and Tino and we decided on Jack’s position, for Rashy (Marcus Rashford), for Anthony (Gordon) and for Ebs (Eberechi Eze).

“So competition is up, they will stay in the mix. I know how desperate they are to come back.

“Now they can maybe have a bit more rhythm, like Jack is starting now to play again.”

Foden, who has not featured for Tuchel since the March World Cup qualifiers against Latvia and Albania, is not selected because he is not in Manchester City’s starting XI.

“I’m a big fan of Phil, and how can’t you be?” Tuchel added on talkSPORT.

“He had a brilliant first camp with us, but he simply lacks rhythm. He does not start anymore, since a long time.

“He didn’t start a lot of matches in the Club World Cup, he does not start now in the beginning of the season and that’s simply the rhythm.

“I mentioned the word competition a lot. It is a competition on his position. It is at the moment.

“Yeah, so the decision is for the others, it’s not against Phil and hopefully he can fight.

“He can show the fight, show the hunger to get his place back at Man City. That’s the first step.”

Walker has been left out following his return to the Premier League with Burnley and is another one who has some ground to make up.

“I’m a big fan of Kyle,” he said. “I tried to sign him several times in my career, and I know what he can bring to any team,” he said.

“He decided for a new challenge in Burnley, so he’s a key player and I admire him for this, for his courage to do a step like this, to stay in the strongest league and to go for a completely new challenge in his career.”