Friday’s game will be the first time he has sat on the bench for England since the 0-0 draw against Costa Rica in the World Cup.
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Hodgson was retained despite his team suffering the same fate in Brazil. They need to change their chip’. “Stuart wasn’t so lucky…”
The ESPN FC crew discuss Wayne Rooney’s absence against Spain where Shaka Hislop backs Roy Hodgson’s team selection. “It’s got nothing to do with whether the RFU is doing the right thing or not”. Having won back to back European championships in 2008 and 2012, La Furia Roja were unceremoniously dumped out of the 2014 World Cup in the group stages.
“We can’t play these games as if they are friendlies”, Spain defender Mario Gaspar said. Rooney is still top quality and has a record number of goals for his country and soon to be club, but not only is he not as effective as he once was in open play, as an out and out striker, but we hopefully have better. “When I was there [at United – from 2004-08] he was really young and I was really young too and he helped me a lot”.
But he has acknowledged he faces “a huge challenge” to keep his place in the face of an emerging generation of rivals.
Additionally, Liverpool’s James Milner, a player Hodgson has consistently picked over the years, has pulled out of the England squad with a hamstring injury, though he should return to the worldwide fold after this pair of friendlies is out of the way.
With Wayne Rooney starting on the bench and Jamie Vardy struggling there is one very obvious goalscoring bet (if we are being patriotic!).
Manchester United striker Rooney will, fitness permitting, instead feature against France next Tuesday. We have to perform and learn the way we want to play better. “Obviously as a player you want to play football but you sometimes have to look at the bigger picture with the Euros (European Championships) approaching”, said Wayne. He is so honest as well and he will make solo runs forward without the ball so to me has lots of good options there.
“I want to prove myself”, he added. “We have to concentrate on these two games”.
“It’s important especially in these games that the manager has a chance to see as many players as he can before the tournament in the summer”, Sky Sports quotes the Manchester United skipper as suggesting.
Sturridge, who has played only three times this season, has scored two league goals. [Wayne] Rooney is the leader, a great player, a great player.
“All I would say is playing up front on your own is very tough”. He is powerful, strong and a cunning poacher relying on his speed and athleticism to sniff out the tiniest of chances and convert them into goals.
“I think the future is unbelievably bright for a player like Ross Barkley”. I wouldn’t like him to think that he’s part of the Spain team because of a past agreement.
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“I feel that’s in him – that fight. He thrives on that and that gets his team-mates going as well”.
