Sweden Thrash Tunisia 5-1, Real Madrid Sign Cucurella for £51.8m, and England Eye Set-Piece Edge Before Croatia Opener

Since covering Japan's late equalizer against Netherlands in Group F, the tournament has rolled on. Sunday and early Monday brought a full slate of news across Group F and beyond.

Sweden 5-1 Tunisia: Potter's Resurrection Is Real

Graham Potter spent the week before this game wearing a Stetson at training. A manager sacked twice in 15 months, playing cowboy in Texas. But at Estadio Monterrey, according to BBC Sport, things changed.

Sweden dismantled Tunisia 5-1. Viktor Gyokeres and Alexander Isak both scored. The five-goal haul exceeded the four total goals Sweden scored across their entire qualifying group stage, per BBC Sport. That group was overseen largely by predecessor Jon Dahl Tomasson before he was dismissed.

Potter was appointed Sweden boss in October after the qualifying damage was already done. The team finished bottom of their group behind Switzerland, Kosovo, and Slovenia without a single win in six games. They reached the play-offs only because their UEFA Nations League ranking (34th) bought them a second chance. They beat Ukraine and then Poland to get to this tournament.

"You never know, that's the truth," Potter told BBC Sport after the final whistle. "We were optimistic because we felt confident in the work. But until the game is played you don't know for sure."

The Tunisia caveat is real. This is not a heavyweight opponent. But five goals is five goals, and Potter's contract has already been extended through 2030.

Brighton midfielder Yasin Ayari scored a long-range thunderbolt for Sweden and refused to celebrate. Per BBC Sport, Ayari's father is Tunisian, making the goal a complicated one to mark.

The Bellingham Question England Hasn't Answered Yet

England haven't played yet. Their opener against Croatia is scheduled for Wednesday at 21:00 BST, and the biggest pre-tournament debate—per BBC Sport reporting from Kansas City—is whether Jude Bellingham or Morgan Rogers starts at number 10 under Thomas Tuchel.

Bellingham, 22, has 48 caps and is heading into his third major tournament. Jordan Henderson, 35, has backed him publicly and forcefully. "He really gives us an X-factor in our team," Henderson told BBC Sport. "He has had big moments in his career, he is a big game player."

Henderson acknowledged the criticism is real but pushed back on its fairness: "I find it hard to read sometimes really because I just know just how big an influence he is on this team."

The strongest case against Bellingham starting isn't the criticism. It's the genuine tactical question of whether Rogers offers Tuchel something more flexible in the 10 role. That question remained unresolved as of Monday morning.

England's Set-Piece Blueprint, Borrowed from Arsenal

Tuchel's tactical focus heading into the Croatia game is set-pieces, according to BBC Sport's Sami Mokbel. England are leaning hard into them, explicitly modeling their approach on Arsenal's system, which produced 19 Premier League goals from corners last season alone.

Declan Rice, Reece James, and Bukayo Saka are listed as Tuchel's primary dead-ball specialists. The squad's physical profile helps. Of the 10 outfield starters who played the Costa Rica warmup, only James and Elliot Anderson are under 6 feet tall.

One complication: BBC Sport reports there is concern inside the England camp about managing Saka through the early stage of the tournament due to ongoing tendonitis. Whether that limits his role as a set-piece taker isn't confirmed.

Real Madrid Sign Cucurella for £51.8m

This one is confirmed and done. Real Madrid announced the signing of Chelsea's Marc Cucurella on a six-year deal worth £47.5m plus £4.3m in add-ons, according to BBC Sport. The deal was struck Sunday and formally announced Monday.

Cucurella, 27, is currently with Spain at the World Cup. He joined Chelsea from Brighton in 2022 for £63m, meaning Chelsea sold him at a roughly £11m loss before add-ons. Chelsea's circumstances played a role. The club finished 10th last season, failed to qualify for Europe, went through manager Enzo Maresca's mid-season departure, then Liam Rosenior's sacking, then caretaker Calum McFarlane, and have since appointed Xabi Alonso for 2026-27, per BBC Sport.

Cucurella had three years left on his contract and gave an interview during the March international break criticizing Chelsea's hierarchy, per BBC Sport. His desire to return to Spain—he came through Barcelona's academy—was reportedly a driving factor.

Real Madrid under Jose Mourinho, recently reappointed on a three-year deal per BBC Sport, are also reportedly pursuing Bernardo Silva from departing Manchester City and Inter Milan's Denzel Dumfries. Ibrahima Konate is described as set to join after leaving Liverpool.

The Liverpool Subplot Worth Watching

New Liverpool boss Andoni Iraola, who succeeded the sacked Arne Slot, used day four of the tournament as a scouting session, per BBC Sport's Phil McNulty. His primary focus: Florian Wirtz, the £116m signing from Bayer Leverkusen who underperformed badly in his first Anfield season.

Wirtz played on the left in Germany's 7-1 rout of Curacao—against a side ranked 82nd in the world, a context worth keeping—and showed the creativity and quick thinking that had been largely absent at Liverpool. BBC Radio 5 Live pundit Chris Sutton, present in Houston, said: "The Liverpool fans who watched the game, especially in the first half, would be wondering if it was the same Florian Wirtz who played for them last season."

For Iraola, the unresolved question is whether Wirtz's issue at Liverpool was positional, played out of position by Slot, or psychological, weighed down by the price tag and expectations. Germany's performance doesn't answer that definitively, but it gives Iraola a starting hypothesis to test when the club season resumes.