Why Morgan Rogers may have secured his place as England's World Cup No 10

Morgan Rogers may have just pushed himself to the front of the queue to be England's No 10 at this summer’s World Cup, if he was not there already.

The in-form playmaker’s sparkling performance for Aston Villa in last night’s 3-0 Europa League final win over Freiburg once again underlined his Three Lions credentials.

Here, DAZN News reporter Ross Heppenstall analyses Rogers’ star qualities ahead of Thomas Tuchel’s World Cup squad announcement on Friday. 

A season of fluctuating form

Rogers has been Villa’s greatest attacking weapon in the past couple of seasons, a key figure in the club’s dramatic rise under Unai Emery.

The 2025-26 campaign has seen the 23-year-old blow hot and cold at times, though, and he has not always truly convinced.

He enjoyed a fine first half to the season, opening the scoring for England in their 3-0 friendly win over Wales in early October, which was soon followed by his first Villa goal of the campaign in a 2-1 win at Tottenham Hotspur.

Rogers engineered the space to evade Spurs defenders and hit a delightful 20-yard strike, which flew over Guglielmo Vicario and dipped under the crossbar.

From there, Rogers really began to motor, scoring match-winning braces in victories at Leeds United and West Ham before another double in a 2-1 home success against Manchester United.

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However, his form tailed off heading into 2026 and he attracted criticism from ex-Villa striker Stan Collymore for his performance in the recent 1-0 defeat at Nottingham Forest in the first leg of the Europa League semi-final.

Collymore took to X to tweet: “Rogers. Gets on the plane but playing himself off it week by week. No chance he starts ahead of [Jude] Bellingham.”

Back to his best when it matters most?

Despite Collymore’s criticism, Rogers has produced two huge performances in Villa’s last two games against Liverpool and Freiburg in the Europa League final.

Last Friday, he scored a typical Rogers goal against Arne Slot’s side with a superb curling shot in a 4-2 win, which confirmed that Villa would be playing in next season’s Champions League.

And then last night in Istanbul, Rogers took centre stage after helping to orchestrate Villa’s dominant 3-0 victory.

He scored their final goal and there was a swagger about his performance all night as Villa won their first major trophy in 30 years and their first European silverware since lifting the European Cup in 1982.

“Before Christmas and right after, I felt untouchable: the best Premier League player, which is what I want to be,” said Rogers in the build-up to the final.

After the last two games, maybe he is in that bracket again – and that certainly spells good news for England with the World Cup coming into clear focus.

Can Rogers secure the No 10 shirt for the World Cup opener against Croatia on June 17?

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Fierce competition for a key position

Perhaps nowhere else on the field does Tuchel have as many options as he does in the No 10 role.

While Rogers appears to be timing to his return to form to perfection, he faces stiff competition from a number of players.

Jude Bellingham is universally regarded as a world-class talent and, at the age of 22, he has already achieved so much at club and international level.

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The Real Madrid man has won back his place in the England squad, although there has been some high-profile moments of tension with Tuchel.

Morgan Gibbs-White is another mercurial talent who has almost single-handedly driven Nottingham Forest to Premier League safety in recent weeks.

His stats – goals scored and assists – cannot be underestimated and lagging behind Rogers, Bellingham and Gibbs-White are Cole Palmer and Phil Foden.

That pair have not had their best seasons at club level and it seems likely that at least one of them will miss out.

Jarrod Bowen and Eberechi Eze also harbour hopes of making the plane.

Rogers has 11 assists across all competitions this term and is bang in form, so a place in the squad looks assured. 

Perhaps the real question is whether he can make the cut for Tuchel’s starting XI.

The former England striker’s view

Michael Owen scored 40 goals for the Three Lions during a distinguished international career, which harvested 89 caps.

He was the boy wonder at the World Cup in France ’98, scoring a sensational individual goal against Argentina, and believes Bellingham has to start for England this summer.

“I like Bellingham personally, but I’m not sure the manager does,” said Owen, who is UK ambassador for the online casino comparison site Casino.org, and exclusively told DAZN News.

“But I’d start Bellingham. To be honest, I’m not asked who plays in those three players in behind, whether it’s Saka and Rashford and Bellingham to start with and then bring, you know, Bowen and Eze and Gordon or whoever it might be to change the life out of those positions.

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“And I don’t care who starts because, if I was a manager, I’d only be playing each of them half of the game anyway.

“In fact, you could argue that you bring your better three on for the second half when teams are getting tired and things are opening up a little bit more.

“So actually, people always associate the best players with starting all the time.

“Football is changing and substitutes can bring change and freshness in the heat which could be the key in this World Cup.

“You could argue that you bring on, whoever the first choice front three are, actually are the ones that come on at half-time.”

“We might have to do something a bit different and think a little bit outside the box to win this tournament.”

 

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