The names everyone wanted to talk about were the ones missing. Foden. Palmer. Trent. Those absences had been argued about before the Wembley film had even finished. Rogers being in it generated a different kind of reaction, quieter, more puzzled. Not outrage. Just a lot of people opening a new tab.
He is 23. He plays for Aston Villa. He scored ten league goals this season. Beyond that, unless you watch Villa regularly, the details thin out fast.
THE BACKSTORY
Manchester City let him go. That is where it starts and it is worth saying plainly because City’s academy produces an enormous amount of talent and the ones who leave before making the first team are not always the ones who were wrong.
Bournemouth in 2021, Championship football, barely played. Blackpool in January 2023, one goal before the season ended.
Middlesbrough came in permanently in July 2023. The fee was not disclosed and the move did not make many lists of the summer’s interesting transfers because Rogers was 21 and the Championship was the Championship. He played twenty-six times, scored six, assisted five.
Villa paid £9.4 million in February 2024. By that summer he was a Premier League player.
The 2024/25 season was eight goals and ten assists. Fine numbers, nothing that made anyone stop mid-scroll. Then January 2025, Celtic in the Champions League at Villa Park, and Rogers scored twice before most people had sat down. He finished the hat-trick before half time. Player of the match. The second youngest English player to score a Champions League hat-trick. April, PSG in the quarter-final, Rogers scored again. There is a version of this player who saves something for the games that matter.
For the full picture of every selection Tuchel made and who else missed out, our England World Cup 2026 squad breakdown covers every call including the ones that generated far more debate than Rogers.
THIS SEASON
Ten league goals. Six assists. Thirty-seven Premier League starts. Villa won the Europa League and Rogers played fifteen times in the competition, scoring three and assisting five, including in the knockout rounds. The club had not won in Europe since 1982. He was part of the squad that changed that.
The issue with Rogers is that he does not have a defining moment that people outside Villa can point to. He scores goals across a season rather than one goal people watch back on repeat for a week. That kind of consistent output tends not to travel far beyond the people who watch every game. He had a good season. Most of it happened quietly.
Emery does not have a fixed position for him. Sometimes the ten, sometimes wide left, sometimes wide right. He plays where the team needs him and the numbers stay consistent regardless.
WHY TUCHEL PICKED HIM
Foden did not press enough against Japan and Uruguay. Palmer gave the ball away for the goal against Japan. Both are not going to the World Cup. Rogers is.
What Rogers does when Villa do not have the ball is the argument for this selection. He presses, he gets back, he does not go missing for twenty minutes while waiting for the ball to come to him. Emery built a system at Villa that demands constant movement and work from every attacking player and Rogers has done it for two seasons without complaint. Tuchel watched Foden not do it enough against Japan and made his call. Rogers is what the opposite of that looks like.
The position thing matters too. Tuchel needs options in a squad without Foden or Palmer, without a natural ten beyond Bellingham. Rogers can play the ten, can play wide left, can play wide right. He played all three at different points this season for Villa. That is not a reason to pick someone on its own but it makes every other reason slightly stronger.
THE REALISTIC PICTURE
Nobody is pretending he starts against Croatia. Saka has the right. Bellingham has the ten. The front positions in Tuchel’s first XI are set before Dallas. Rogers at this World Cup, if he gets a World Cup at all, is twenty minutes off the bench in a game that needs something different.
Whether that happens or not, this selection is the one that tells you most about how Tuchel thinks. Not the most gifted player available in his position. The one who does the work, who fits the shape, who has a full season of evidence behind him. Rogers spent twelve months at Villa proving he could contribute consistently in Premier League and European football while doing the pressing and tracking that Tuchel requires. Tuchel watched and drew his conclusions.
Foden is at home watching on television. Rogers is going to Dallas. Football does not always reward the most talented person in the room.
For every confirmed squad heading into June and how England’s group opponents are shaping up, our World Cup 2026 squad tracker is updated daily, and when June 17 arrives our guide to the best ways to stream England’s World Cup games covers every broadcast option in the UK.