Bukayo Saka's Season: Fitness Concerns Ahead of World Cup

Bukayo Saka has already lived the kind of season that bends careers out of shape.

He danced through those wild north London celebrations as Arsenal finally dragged the Premier League trophy back to their corner of the capital for the first time in 22 years. He then walked straight into the white heat of a Champions League final against Paris Saint-Germain, only to leave with the hollow feeling that comes when a shootout goes the wrong way.

That kind of campaign leaves marks. Saka’s body is showing them.

England’s trump card… if he can stand up

There is no debate about his importance to Mikel Arteta. When Saka is fit and in rhythm, Arsenal revolve around him. England would like to do the same. The problem is that phrase: when fit.

An Achilles issue has lingered for months, stubborn and awkward, and it has followed him into this World Cup. When England opened their campaign against Croatia, Saka was not the one prowling that familiar right flank. He was sat on the bench, watching club team-mate Noni Madueke take his spot.

He has not yet taken a full part in training ahead of Tuesday’s meeting with Ghana. For a player used to being the first name on every team sheet, the stop-start pattern is jarring.

John Barnes, who knows the demands of international tournament football out wide better than most, cuts straight to the point.

“It’s his fitness,” he told GOAL, speaking in association with viagogo and their ‘World Cuts’ campaign. “I mean, his form has been great for Arsenal, but it’s his fitness.”

Madueke is ready to go. Saka, for now, is not quite there.

“Madueke is fit, so therefore he may be ahead of him at that particular moment in time,” Barnes said. “So, obviously, Thomas Tuchel will know how fit he is, how much he can influence games. We know the quality he actually has, so I think it’s really just down to his fitness.”

The former England winger does not pretend to know the medical detail. He just understands the reality of tournament selection.

“I don’t know how fit he is, how many games he’s had, whether Madueke is ahead of him. From a form perspective or a quality perspective, we can see what he can do. So I think his fitness is the biggest issue as to whether he starts for England or not.”

Goals, numbers… and what really matters

Saka’s season, for all its highs, was also punctured by absences. Those spells out of the side left him with 11 goals in all competitions, only seven of them in the Premier League. For a 24-year-old forward at the top of the game, that column will always be scrutinised.

Barnes is unimpressed by the obsession.

“His goal output doesn’t have to be great if they win the league,” he said. “And if England wins the World Cup, he doesn’t score one goal, it’s not important. What’s important is him being part of a team that can win.”

That is the lens through which he views Tuchel’s England as well.

“Once again, I don’t think Thomas Tuchel is looking at individual numbers because if he scores more and Marcus Rashford scores more, you know what that means? Harry Kane will score less.

“So it’s about the way you play to create for other people to score. I don’t think he’ll worry about his goal-scoring form, because it’s not about the individual and what he does. If he can be part of a team and help that team to win, then I’m sure his lack of goals isn’t going to be an issue.”

Barnes reels off the names that really matter in this structure: Jude Bellingham, Kane, the other attacking pieces England can feed.

“It’s to do with how the team performs, to create chances for maybe Jude Bellingham and for Harry Kane to score, for them to work hard as a team, to be creative, and yes, they may score the odd goal.

“So he’s looking at the way the team plays, rather than how any individual performs, Thomas Tuchel, which is the right thing to do.”

Tuchel’s balancing act

Tuchel has already shown his hand with Saka: caution, not desperation. England believe they will be in North America for the long haul, and the German is determined not to burn one of his most valuable players in the group stage.

Against Croatia, he turned to Saka from the bench. The Arsenal man did not ease his way in; he helped drive the move that ended with Marcus Rashford finishing off a 4-2 win. It was a reminder of what he brings when the legs respond to the brain’s ideas.

“Bukayo is ready and will get more and more ready,” Tuchel said afterwards. “I think once we go to the last game of this group he will be ready.”

That last group game, against Panama on Saturday, now looms as a quiet deadline. Will Saka be “ready” in the way Tuchel means – not just able to play, but able to start, to sprint, to repeat, to carry a tournament load?

For now, the signs are mixed. Over the weekend, as Tuchel’s squad worked on the grass in preparation for Ghana, Saka stayed inside, following an individual programme. He was the only player not involved in the group session.

England can cope without him for a while. Madueke has shown he can handle the stage. Rashford and others can carry the goals.

But tournaments turn on moments, and few in this squad shape them quite like Bukayo Saka. The question hanging over England is no longer about his talent. It is whether his body will let him decide this World Cup in the way his football says he should.