Roy Hodgson says he won’t be dictated to by Brendan Rodgers
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Version 0 of 1. Roy Hodgson has described as “dangerous” the complaint from Brendan Rodgers that England’s training routines were to blame for Daniel Sturridge’s thigh injury, describing it as untrue and also reminding the Liverpool manager that he has no right to think he can unduly influence his selections for the national team. Hodgson has agreed to leave out Daniel Sturridge from England’s next two Euro 2016 qualifiers against San Marino and Estonia after being assured he is unfit and risks being undermined if the striker plays for Liverpool in Saturday’s game against West Bromwich Albion. Hodgson said he would be “surprised” if that were the case but has not ruled it out, adding that it would then become “a matter for discussion”. The England manager said his relationship with Rodgers had not suffered but he is unhappy about the allegation that Sturridge was training against his wishes and should have been given a 48-hour recovery period when he suffered the injury on international duty in early September that has kept him out for nearly a month. “I don’t remember that,” Hodgson said. “That’s dangerous, that one. I don’t remember that at all. That’s interesting. We will check that up with other members of staff. I don’t have any memory of Daniel telling me that he didn’t want to train. “He never asked [to be given 48 hours]. I’ve never been asked to give 48 hours to any player. If I am under pressure to give each player two days off between games we won’t train at all. If every time we give two days off, we will be down to 20 days’ training in the course of the next year and a half. For me that is unacceptable. We need to work with the players.” Hodgson added: “The interesting thing for the session where Daniel got injured is that he was quite keen to take part because he was such an important part of it, and we were trying to develop a new system of play. He was the forward who understood it best. He was more than happy to come in and help us to get our points over. I understand Brendan being unhappy. We are never happy when we send a player back injured, but we do our best.” Hodgson and Rodgers spoke on Wednesday and the Liverpool manager now says he “does not think the same will happen again”. Yet Hodgson, facing questions about whether he had come out second-best in a club-versus-country dispute, clearly sees it a different way and he also responded to Rodgers publicly stating that Raheem Sterling should be rested from international duty. “I need to win games, just as he does. I need my best players. He [Sterling] has played quite a lot but there must be six or seven who have played as many minutes. I do not expect managers to tell me whether players should be selected, no more than I would dream of telling them who to pick.” Despite both managers insisting there was no lingering friction, it is clearly a sensitive matter that could return to haunt Rodgers if Sturridge features for Liverpool this weekend. “We will wait and see if he does play [against WBA]. Let’s wait and see. If he does play at the weekend that will be a matter for some discussion. But let’s wait and see first. We’ve checked his fitness. I was told on Tuesday by our doctor that Daniel Sturridge would not be fit.” England’s squad features recalls for Jonjo Shelvey and Kieran Gibbs and a first call-up for the Southampton full-back Nathaniel Clyne, with Luke Shaw and Calum Chambers switching to the Under-21 squad for their two-legged playoff against Croatia. Danny Rose and Jack Colback have been left out but Hodgson said there was no lingering issue with Shelvey after revealing that the Swansea midfielder had not figured for the Under-21s for the last year because the manager, Gareth Southgate, suspected commitment issues. “I go on the relationship I have with him,” he said. “I believe Gareth spoke to him and he was reticent, maybe, to play in a game or two and Gareth chose other people, as he’s quite entitled to do. I advised Gareth to have a conversation with him and to make sure that he was going to be 100% on board. “If he did turn him [Southgate] down, he wouldn’t be the first player who’s done that. I’ve had players who turned down first-team national places, which I will keep to myself. I will do what other people have done: put it out there and refuse to name any names. I’ll put it in my book.” Hodgson defended Wayne Rooney after England’s captain was sent off in his last match for Manchester United. “It is not an everyday occurrence. It was a clumsy attempt, not a case of ‘back to the bad old days’. Forwards make clumsy attempts when they try to make professional fouls. “He did it clumsily and the referee was right to send him off but I didn’t see anything malicious and I don’t see a reason to question his temperament. He was working hard for his team at the time. If anything, it is a product of ambition rather than anything else.” |