He has scored a solitary goal for England in seven appearances. His only previous outing under current national coach Thomas Tuchel was on 10 June last year as an 88th-minute substitute in a friendly defeat by Senegal. For the previous four squads, his name was absent. Moreover, he is now 30 years old and plays his football far from the Premier League spotlight in Saudi Arabia.
It is fair to say that few people were predicting a place for Ivan Toney in England’s squad for the FIFA World Cup 2026™.
Yet the 30-year-old Al Ahli striker has emerged as probably the biggest surprise on Tuchel’s squad list for the finals in North America, as the German named him as one of three centre-forwards in his squad along with his Bayern Munich-based captain, Harry Kane, and Aston Villa’s Ollie Watkins.
Among the candidates overlooked were Dominic Calvert-Lewin, who has scored 14 Premier League goals for Leeds United this season and was included in the squad for England’s March friendlies against Uruguay and Japan, and Tottenham Hotspur’s Dominic Solanke who featured in both of those March fixtures.
Yet Tuchel clearly sees something in Toney, who has scored goals in all four levels of the English professional pyramid – from Northampton Town, his hometown club, to Brentford, via Barnsley, Shrewsbury Town, Scunthorpe United, Wigan Athletic and Peterborough United.
Toney’s best season in the Premier League was in 2022/23 when he hit 20 goals for Brentford. Yet for pure numbers, he had just had his most prolific season ever with 32 goals in 32 appearances for Al Ahli, who finished third in the Saudi Premier League. That total included four hat-tricks.
“We could see that he still collects the numbers,” Tuchel told reporters after today’s official confirmation of the squad. “I think he has very special skills that could help us, the situations, scenarios when we’re chasing a result.
“I think he can be a very valuable addition to Harry Kane, he can be present in the box when we’re pushing for a goal.
“He can take attention off other strikers, he has a natural presence within the box, he’s a natural finisher, he can help us with set-pieces. He’s very strong in there, very good in using his body and not to forget, he is a world-class penalty taker. He ticks some boxes that we wanted to be ticked.”
On the subject of penalties, Toney converted one in England’s quarter-final shoot-out win over Switzerland at UEFA EURO 2024, when he appeared as a late substitute in three games. The fact he has 12 successful spot-kicks to his name in the season just concluded is likely to have featured in the reports Tuchel received from Al Ahli’s German coach, Mathias Jaissle.
Tuchel added: “I had fantastic feedback from his club coach, who was my player, and I have a close connection with him, always fantastic feedback about his role there, about his ability, his fitness.”
Tuchel may also retain the memory of a match against Toney in his time as Chelsea manager. On 2 April 2022, Toney was in the Brentford team who recorded their first win at Chelsea since 1939 – a 4-1 success against Tuchel’s team. He did not score that day but claimed an assist with a lovely pass for Vitaly Janelt’s goal.
“Sometimes people forget how good a link-up player he is and how good a passer he is,” said Thomas Frank, Brentford’s then manager, that afternoon.
Happily for Toney, Tuchel evidently hasn’t. He may have been out of sight to many English football fans, but not to the man who counts.
