It always pinches to the core when a national side playing a crucial world cup qualifier misses its key players for injury and this is something that seems to be happening with England national team which is about to miss the services of Wayne Rooney. Yes, this is a surprising news but true that Manchester United player will not be available for the England‘s friendly against Spain on Tuesday after missing Three Lions training on Monday morning with a ‘minor’ issue. Rooney is the only one to miss the upcoming national games for injury reason since another player Ryan Bertrand also sustained the minor injury but he will remain with the national side and possibly play in the upcoming qualifiers. Although, no substitute has until been named for the side but as far his captaincy is concerned, 26-year-old Jordan Henderson will again wear the captain’s armband in place of Rooney. If Rooney current injury comes out to be serious, it would be a double blow not only for the Three Lions but as well for Manchester United who will have to play without the services of two of its key players: Rooney and Zlatan Ibrahimovic who is out for a suspension although Mourinho can still use Anthony Martial or Marcus Rashford as the central striker against Arsenal on Saturday.
Interim manager Gareth Southgate talks about the problem they are facing and if it will have any impact over their WC qualification, he said, “We’ve got to make the correct decisions, not the convenient decisions. To make what we believe are the right decisions for the right reasons. It would have been easy to say, ‘OK, we have to win this match… we’ll go solid, soak up pressure, hit teams on the break and play all our experienced players.’ Or, do we do what we did… try to build from the back, play with some risks, involve some younger players who we think are going to be the future, work longer term.
“My view of the game is you manage every game like you’re going to be there forever and make decisions for the long term. Tomorrow what’s the plan? Go selfish, shut up shop, try to eke out a 1-0 or do we say ‘no lads, let’s play with belief, go with what we think is the right way to play.’ We’ll get some of those things wrong but we’ll get a lot right. We have to think further forward.”
Wayne Rooney: Marco Iacobucci EPP / Shutterstock.com