“Go west,” sang the Village People. “Go west,” Thomas Tuchel seems to be telling his players, too.
Because moving from the relative comfort of the Premier League into the kind of suffocating heat expected across large parts of the United States during the 2026 World Cup could amount to something close to thermal shock. And while losing a tournament after 60 years of waiting to a moment of brilliance from Messi or Mbappé might be reluctantly accepted, collapsing in midfield because of the heat is another matter entirely. It is a scenario the England manager is determined to avoid at all costs. Literally.
His latest idea is as simple as it is unorthodox: send the players on a tropical break. The Caribbean, perhaps, or another humid destination somewhere in the Americas—ideally somewhere akin to Florida, where England are due to play upcoming friendlies against New Zealand and Costa Rica. The stay would necessarily be brief, given the squad is set to return to training almost immediately afterwards, but for Tuchel, even passive exposure to the climate has become part of the preparation.
Over the past few months, the German coach has explored every possible lever. He has encouraged players to install saunas and hyperbaric chambers at home. He has had them train inside heated tents designed to replicate the greenhouse conditions expected in some of the tournament’s more punishing venues. He has even turned to ingestible sensors—so-called digital pills—to monitor core body temperature.
Some have read this as meticulousness pushed to the edge of eccentricity. But the concern is grounded in experience. The 1994 World Cup final in Pasadena—still lodged in the collective memory—was played in 40-degree heat under the Californian sun. And for 2026, projections suggest that more than two-thirds of matches will be played in temperatures above 26°C, with some significantly higher, despite repeated warnings that have largely gone unheeded by FIFA.
Against that backdrop, England’s itinerary offers little natural relief. After a short training camp in Florida, Tuchel’s squad will base themselves in Kansas City, Missouri, where the continental climate can be punishing in the summer months. Their opening match, on 17 June against Croatia in Dallas, may well be played in even harsher conditions, with Texas heat often pushing the limits of endurance.
The other two group games, against Ghana and Panama in Boston and New Jersey respectively, should, on paper, offer slightly milder conditions. But in a tournament shaped as much by weather as by tactics, nothing can be taken for granted.
And so Tuchel’s logic is simple: England must be ready for all of it—even for football played in conditions that feel closer to survival than sport.