5 | John Stones - 2023/24

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Tricky_Trev said:
Branthwaite sat on the bench for 180 mins across both games. What was the point of bringing him?
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I can’t be bothered looking him up but…who the heck is Branthwaite?


EDIT: forget I asked that. I remember that horrible little Everton player. If I remember correctly he tried to injure John Stones when we played them the other week!!
 
I’ve just read that JS was only on the pitch 10 minutes. Was he maybe being strategic/sensible? You know, keep in with Wally Waistcoat for the Euros but also keep himself in with Pep with a strategic ‘injury’? Too devious? ;-)
 
Crooked_rain said:
I said on a thread last week you can guarantee stones comes back injured

What a fucking clown Southgate is. Stones is literally the player you least need to have a look at in meaningless friendlies, he's head and shoulders above anyone English in his position, he's the first name on the team sheet by virtue of every other CB being dogshit.

Yet waistcoat plays him in both games, knowing he's a bit injury prone.

There's a reason no club employed this clueless **** after his shitshow tenure at Boro.
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"A bit injury prone" you say.
Nah mate, Stones is very injury prone and he should know that by now.
If the Arsenal lads can turn down playing useless international friendlies at this point of the season, so can Stones.
 
Stones should be a world class defender. His injury record prevents him from being so.

His talent is absolutely not in doubt but top drawer players are also robust and dont have continual niggly injuries like stones does.
 
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Quotes from Southgate:

But Southgate was unrepentant about selecting Stones against Belgium and said that other leading nations did similar with senior players during this international break.

"We did [with Stones] what Holland did with Virgil van Dijk tonight, what Norway did with [Martin] Odegaard and also what the Dutch with Nathan Ake , but it [criticism] only seems to fall on us.

"Of course I am disappointed if he [Stones] has a problem. It seems to be in the adductor area, so we will have to wait and see.

"But John hadn't played for two weeks before joining up with the squad, so it is not an overload problem. But I hate sending players back to their clubs not fully fit."

And therein lies the problem. They did this so why can't we? No Gareth, each player is different and needs to be managed accordingly. You had Gomez and Branthwaite who could have played but you chose to start a player who hasn't this season started two games in such a short space of time. Just because he hadn't played for two weeks isn't a reason to flog him to death. Whatever England do to players in training / conditioning is an issue. Kalvin goes to a World Cup and comes back heavier and unfit compared to when he went, how does that happen?
 
It’s why we have strong back up in defence, unfortunately Stones can’t be relied upon to stay fit.

He either has to accept it’s a problem and really manage his game time or everyone accepts he’s going to miss several chunks of the season each year.
 
Eds said:
Quotes from Southgate:

But Southgate was unrepentant about selecting Stones against Belgium and said that other leading nations did similar with senior players during this international break.

"We did [with Stones] what Holland did with Virgil van Dijk tonight, what Norway did with [Martin] Odegaard and also what the Dutch with Nathan Ake , but it [criticism] only seems to fall on us.

"Of course I am disappointed if he [Stones] has a problem. It seems to be in the adductor area, so we will have to wait and see.

"But John hadn't played for two weeks before joining up with the squad, so it is not an overload problem. But I hate sending players back to their clubs not fully fit."

And therein lies the problem. They did this so why can't we? No Gareth, each player is different and needs to be managed accordingly. You had Gomez and Branthwaite who could have played but you chose to start a player who hasn't this season started two games in such a short space of time. Just because he hadn't played for two weeks isn't a reason to flog him to death. Whatever England do to players in training / conditioning is an issue. Kalvin goes to a World Cup and comes back heavier and unfit compared to when he went, how does that happen?
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Exactly. Sometimes I think just because Southgate speaks in a nice manner that people confused it with intelligence and he's actually a bit dim.

Obviously he's making excuses talking about other countries playing players twice, but if he actually believes in his reasoning and has no concept of managing minutes for players who most need it then that's worrying.

Get him to the rags ASAP
 
Crooked_rain said:
Exactly. Sometimes I think just because Southgate speaks in a nice manner that people confused it with intelligence and he's actually a bit dim.

Obviously he's making excuses talking about other countries playing players twice, but if he actually believes in his reasoning and has no concept of managing minutes for players who most need it then that's worrying.

Get him to the rags ASAP
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Stones hasn't been flogged to death though has he. He played against Liverpool on 10th March and then not until 23rd March against Brazil before starting last night. That's not a packed schedule. He's just an injury prone player, as we see with him picking up issues regularly in games or training.

Hopefully he came off before it aggravated anything further. He's a big miss, but sadly injuries have regularly been an issue.
 
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