Jude Bellingham’s wild side may cost England - but it is a risk worth taking for Thomas Tuchel | OneFootball

Real Madrid midfielder was lucky not to get sent off against Latvia and was given a red card last month for abusing the referee

Before getting stuck into Jude Bellingham, you might have seen that one of England’s No10s of years past, Dele Alli, was back on the pitch for the first time in 748 days as a late substitute for Serie A club Como last week.

Regrettably for Dele, just nine minutes into his long-awaited return he was shown a straight red card for a clumsy tackle on AC Milan’s Ruben Loftus-Cheek, drawing criticism from Como head coach Cesc Fabregas after a 2-1 defeat for his side in the San Siro.

It was a rusty moment from the former Tottenham midfielder but a reminder that the best version of Dele always came with a sharp edge, a tendency towards mischief that felt as inherent to his game as his outstanding timing or touch.

When he was dazzling at Spurs, on his way to back-to-back PFA Young Player of the Year awards, there was a view at the club, championed by then-head coach Mauricio Pochettino, that trying to tame Dele’s wild side would also risk dulling his immense talent.

Already on a booking, Bellingham avoided a second yellow card for this foul on Latvia’s Raivis Jurkovskis at Wembley

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Whenever he was asked about a Dele misdemeanour - which included punching West Brom’s Claudio Yacob and giving the bird to England teammate Kyle Walker - Pochettino would caution against attempts to sanitise his “naughty” player.

When Dele’s fires began to dim, Pochettino remained ever hopeful that “the devil is going to appear [in him] again”.

As the Argentine knew, some players thrive on playing on the edge, their talent wrapped up in an attitude or a petulance which leaves the line between genius and recklessness perilously thin.

Which brings us back to Bellingham, who should have been sent off in England’s 3-0 World Cup qualifying win over Latvia on Monday.

Having been booked in the first half for landing his studs on a Latvian ankle, Bellingham avoided a second yellow card for flying into a sliding tackle shortly after the restart, prompting England head coach Thomas Tuchel to quickly replace him with Phil Foden.

“We were a bit lucky, and took straight away the decision to not take the risk and take him off,” Tuchel said afterwards. “[A red card] would have been harsh but it would have put the game upside down.”

Thomas Tuchel said England ‘were a bit lucky’ Bellingham did not get sent off against Latvia

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In all likelihood, England would still have beaten Latvia with 10 men and there is a danger of exaggerating the severity of Bellingham’s near-miss because the rest of the match was so mind-numbingly routine.

Still, Bellingham is feisty and he is notoriously gobby, a point underlined when he was sent off for Real Madrid against Osasuna last month for telling the referee to “f*** off”; a man down, Real squandered their 1-0 lead to draw 1-1.

It is not at all difficult to imagine a scenario in future where Bellingham pushes a referee too far while wearing an England shirt and it is an easy jump to fear a repeat of Wayne Rooney’s costly red card against Portugal at the 2006 World Cup or David Beckham’s dismissal in the defeat to Argentina at France ’98.

There is a case for Tuchel to have a quiet word with Bellingham ahead of the next camp in June, to remind him of his importance of England’s mission to “put a second star on the shirt” at next summer’s World Cup.

Equally, however, like Rooney or Dele before him, Bellingham does not feel like a player that necessarily can or should be tamed by a coach.

His pumped-up personality feels as much a feature of his brilliance as his last-minute winners or inspirational pieces of forward play, and while his discipline has occasionally cost Real (he was also sent off against Valencia last season), there is no sense Carlo Ancelotti wants him to calm down.

Bellingham may eventually cost England, too, but there is every chance it would be a price worth paying, given his sublime quality.