Thomas Tuchel swapped the dugout for the mound as the England boss threw the first pitch for the Kansas City Royals the night after opening the World Cup with an impressive win.
Just over 24 hours after watching his side open their campaign with a 4-2 victory over Croatia, Tuchel went to Kauffman Stadium to perform the ceremonial act.
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Captain Harry Kane and defenders Dan Burn and Djed Spence were watching their boss throw the ball to Royals manager Matt Quatraro ahead of the MLB clash with the St Louis Cardinals.
Kane is no stranger to finding the strike zone, taking his World Cup tally to 10 goals with a double against Croatia, and as a keen fan of American sports, he would like to do it with a bat in hand.
“Great recovery day with the boys at the baseball,” he said on social media.
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“Would love to give batting a go one day! Thanks for having us @Royals.”
Kane, who was pictured leaving the AT&T Stadium in Dallas with his left leg bandaged, had a low-key recovery day.
“He got a strike, so fair play to him,” Kane, who has thrown out a first pitch at Yankees and Cubs games, told KansasCity.com
“It’s not easy. It’s actually… that was the first time I’ve been up mound in 12 years, so you forget how far away it actually is.
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“So, watching the professionals do it, and they’re launching that ball at 90, 100 miles per hour, it’s pretty impressive. So the boss has done pretty well. I’ll give him that. He was a little nervous before.”
He added: “We really appreciate it.
“I can say, for us to come here and get the treatment that we have already is obviously great. And I’m not sure where we’re sitting, but I’m sure the seats will be great, as well. So, yeah, all we can say is thank you to them.”
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Those who did not feature against Croatia played in a behind-closed-doors friendly against MLS side Sporting KC.
Ivan Toney scored a hat-trick and Aston Villa duo Morgan Rogers and Ollie Watkins got on the scoresheet as England ran out 5-1 winners in a short game consisting of two periods of 22 minutes.
Harry Kane, right, congratulates Tuchel after the pitch (Charlie Riedel/AP)
Kane said on local TV station FOX4 News Kansas City: “It was great, great for the guys who didn’t get enough minutes yesterday to top up the tank.
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“It was a good test. Thanks for Sporting for doing the game, I thought they held themselves to a great standard, got a nice free-kick goal themselves.
“From a football point of view, we knew it would be a game where we could score a few goals, which we did, but they put a good test in and we got out of it exactly what we needed.”
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source uk.sports.yahoo.com ’
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