His injuries and the form of Dias maybe why were are looking at Branthwaite.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.
Plan was Akanji to pull a sickie ;)Let's face it; we all knew it was going to happen. I would expect that Pep already had his plan B in place for Sunday.
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?
He deserves to get any shit coming his way if he’s there on Sunday..When you start with an excuse You know your wrong and hope Pep will tell him so on Sunday because no doubt this moron be there..
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?