England’s attacking lineup includes Saido Berahino, Danny Ings as well as Kane, and Southgate is excited by their potential.
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Jesse Lingard, the Manchester United flyer who has been on loan with Derby County this past season, is set to step in for Berahino for the game in Uherske Hradiste tonight.
“He’s been with us from the very first game, scored our first goal and has been a huge part of the reason why we’re here”.
CROCKED: Saido Berahino is ruled out of Euro 2015 [GETTY] “It’s a great shame he will not be able to finish the job”.
“It’s important we move on and the rest of the group respond”, said Southgate.
The forward will fly home immediately from the Championships in the Czech Republic and receive treatment at Albion.
The experience he garnered during that period was partly behind his decision to have a low-key day after the Portugal defeat, with the players spending time with loved ones as well as doing a light recovery session and mini golf competition. He is confident that his squad are ready for all eventualities and Middlesbrough’s Ben Gibson will take Stones’ place.
“I’ve kept in contact with him in case something like this happened”, said manager Southgate. It was quite an even game, we were looking at the stats today and there wasn’t much in it. It’s fine margins, especially in tournament football.
It is a measure of just how famous Harry Kane has become in the past nine months that the travelling fans in the Czech Republic from Sweden, whom England play at the European U-21s Championship tomorrow, already have a song about him.
Previous to the news of Berahino’s injury Southgate’s faith in his forwards has been unshakeable to the extent that he says there has been no greater test for his defenders than facing those three in training.
“I think they are as good as anything”, he said. I always remember talking to Keano [Roy Keane, a fellow ITV pundit] about him training against Nicky Butt. There is a Twitter campaign aimed at making him the man to join Lionel Messi on the front cover of the Fifa 16 video game.
“I don’t think I’ll miss the start of the season”.
“The key over the last 24 hours has been to get some emotional stability in the group”, Southgate said.
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“They have some excellent players as we have got and from what I have seen we can still have faith in what we do”.
