Thomas Tuchel claimed it was "perfectly normal" for England to rely on Harry Kane - despite struggling in their defeat to Japan without the Bayern Munich ace.

An injury in training meant the Englishman marksman had to watch the underwhelming Wembley display from the stands. For a decade Kane has dominated the England No 9 shirt, so much so that there is no clear back-up waiting in the wings.

Rarely absent, England have been able to continue relying on Kane, but his absence in the loss to Japan shone a light on the lack of goals when he is missing. Tuchel though defended their reliance on the Bayern star, who has scored 48 times already this term.

The German insisted that is was normal for a team to place such importance on an individual player - citing the manner in which Argentina look to Lionel Messi and Portugal turn to Cristiano Ronaldo.

He told ITV: "Why would Argentina not rely on Messi or Portugal not rely on Cristiano Ronaldo? It is totally normal and I think key players left camp for a bit and we saw that a bit.

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"We lacked a bit of punch in the final 20 metres, maybe in both matches, but we encouraged the players. It was difficult, in the first-half we played way too narrow, second-half we had more width and were more dynamic, took more risks, had more chances but couldn't convert."

With Kane unavailable Tuchel turned to Phil Foden to play in a false nine role, rather than simply deploy another striker instead of the Bayern star. Dominic Solanke took up a spot on the bench, but the England boss didn't see any issue with the system he employed. Foden played centrally with Morgan Rogers, Cole Palmer and Anthony Gordon supporting him - but it took England until beyond the 70th minute to post their first shot on target.

"It was only a false nine on one side, on the other side it was a normal nine," said Tuchel. "We need to put it into perspective, it is not the end of the world. It is never nice and we don't like it but it's not a question of false nine or normal nine, it is a matter of performing and making a statement, and winning one on ones, and being brave. We can do better but it is a well drilled team that we are playing against, a new formation and new players."

Tuchel also rejected the notion that certain players were struggling to deal with the pressure of playing for England. The ex-Chelsea boss said he "didn't want to engage in this discussion".

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