Manchester United boss Jose Mourinho risked a dressing room revolt by angrily telling England defenders Smalling and Shaw to “man up” after claiming they refused to play at Swansea on Sunday.
However, England interim boss, Garry Southgate confirmed the Football Association’s medical staff had checked with United and both were deemed as being not fit to report for England duty ahead of the World Cup qualifier with Scotland.
Nontheless, that goes against Mourinho’s accusation and Southgate insisted that neither player is “flaky”.
“I don’t know Chris well. But that wouldn’t be my impression (that he is flaky), having worked with him. I know Luke well and he’s had a really tough injury.
“There have been players that haven’t played as much when I was playing, maybe playing for England was a bit too much for them."
Southgate believes that Luke Shaw's horrific leg break last year should be put into consideration while handling the full-back. He said; “After an injury as severe as that, we’ve got to handle that with care as well.
“That is definitely part of the process of getting a player back into playing. Maybe that at times is to be aggressive and maybe that at times is to be supportive.
“There can be different approaches towards that because sometimes you might need a nudge to say, ‘Come on, you can.’
"But I can’t comment on the two guys because I don’t know the real specifics of exactly where they’re at.”
No comments:
Post a Comment