Premier League coach joins Thomas Tuchel’s England staff as membership give blessing
England boss Thomas Tuchel has brought onboard a Premier League coach to work under him as the Three Lions prepare to begin their World Cup Qualifiying campaign next month
Brentford coach Justin Cochrane has agreed to work under new England boss Thomas Tuchel.
Cochrane will join Tuchel’s senior coaching team, and combine the job with his full-time role working with the Bees’ first team. The 43-year-old is no stranger to the England set-up, having been a head coach of some of the youth teams.
During his time at the FA, Cochrane also observed the senior set-up and was part of the travelling party for the 2019 UEFA U21 European Championship.
Before joining Brentford in 2022, Cochrane worked as head of player development and coaching at Manchester United. He has also had coaching roles with Tottenham’s academy and AFC Wimbledon’s first team.
Tuchel has added Cochrane as the final appointment to a support team that includes assistant Anthony Barry, goalkeeping coach Henrique Hilário and performance coach Nicolas Mayer.
The former Chelsea boss officially took charge of England on January 1 and has regularly been seen in Premier League stands casting a keen eye over a number of players who could feature in his first squad, which will be named in the coming weeks.
England will begin their 2026 World Cup Qualifying campaign on March 21 when they host Albania, before the second Wembley doubleheader sees the Three Lions welcome Latvia three days later.
The Three Lions have been drawn in Group K, and they couldn’t have asked for a kinder draw. England will play Andorra and Serbia in their other group games, with Tuchel’s team travelling to the former in June before returning to the City Ground to entertain Senegal in a friendly.
Tuchel has been tasked with ending England’s 60-year wait for a major trophy, something he said is the target. “Nothing is impossible in sports,” Tuchel said.
“The federation is there, the women did it, the under-21s did it, so there is no reason [we can’t]. At some point we have to free ourselves from history, we have to focus on the process and this will start from January.”
