For much of the last year, it's felt like England might have been better giving Lee Carsley the top job.
Thomas Tuchel was appointed for an elite CV which would provide "edge" in big games but where was the actual impact? The team looked stodgy, the results were mediocre and the whole thing was veering dangerously into "meh" territory.
Carsley appeared inoffensive but he tried things. All-out attack at Wembley against Greece was mad scientist stuff but when it blew up in his face he wasn't afraid to admit it was an experiment. After the conservatism of Gareth Southgate, that's what England needed.
It still is. The Football Association aren't paying Tuchel £5m a year to tread water so it was about time he put his stamp on proceedings. View the decision to drop Jude Bellingham - for that is what this is, despite the conciliatory words - as step one in that process.
No one disputes that Bellingham is a top-class talent, or that with him in the team England's potential level is lifted. But the Real Madrid midfielder is not Diego Maradona or Lionel Messi, a one man force of nature who can drag a team to a World Cup title. So Tuchel is right to fire a shot across the bows of a man who arrives on England duty with more scrutiny than anyone else.
The Three Lions boss chose his words cautiously. But in admitting that Bellingham had wanted to join the squad when they spoke on the phone, he made a point. No one is bigger than a collective that will need to be united to win the World Cup.
The England manager said back in August that some of Bellingham's on-field behaviour was "repulsive" - a comment he later rowed back and apologised for, excusing his candour by explaining he was talking in his second language.
But it also felt pointed that he praised the unity and positivity of his last camp, when relative novices like Elliot Anderson and Morgan Rogers stepped up to deliver the best performance of the Tuchel era in Belgrade.
The official reason for omitting Bellingham is that there remain concerns over his fitness. He is yet to find his "rhythm" for Real Madrid, Tuchel has suggested. He made a point of saying there is absolutely no problem with Bellingham.
But Tuchel probably won't mind people putting two and two together and coming up with the conclusion that this is a warning shot to a player who was assumed to be one of the first names on the team sheet.
Not only does it send a message to Bellingham to rein in some of his worst excesses but it also sends a clarion call out to the rest of the squad that no one is safe if their form or fitness fails.
If Tuchel stays true to that principle - and it is admittedly curious that Adam Wharton hasn't been rewarded for his excellence at Crystal Palace - then he will be doing something that every England fan has craved under successive managers.
In that respect it is bigger than Bellingham. Right back to the days of Sven-Goran Eriksson settling on a farcical compromise in the choice between Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard England have been in thrall to their biggest names.
Last summer Southgate stuck with Harry Kane throughout the Euros even when it was absolutely glaringly obvious that there were other options who would have offered England more thrust.
You suspect that Tuchel will return to Bellingham for the November games. But the way he has spoken in glowing terms about the September group injects that element of doubt into his decision-making. That is how it should be.