Jack Grealish has pointed out the wealth of attacking options at Gareth Southgate's disposal as the reason why Phil Foden has seen little action in the World Cup so far.
The England manager has come in for a heap of criticism over the last couple of days after he didn't introduce Foden off the bench during his side's drab, goalless draw with the United States on Friday. Southgate explained afterwards that he didn't bring Foden on in a central attacking position as he hasn't been playing there for Manchester City much recently.
Many have responded by arguing that Foden could have come on in the attack but instead, Southgate opted to start Bukayo Saka and Raheem Sterling and then brought Grealish and Marcus Rashford on from the bench. It has left Foden on just 19 minutes of World Cup action so far.
City's No.10 believes that having so many attacking options has reduced Foden's minutes but thinks he will still get his chance in the tournament.
“We obviously all know how good Phil is," he told TalkSport. "But there are a lot of players in them forward positions who all bring different stuff, different attributes and I’m sure Phil we get his chance. Hopefully, he does.
"He is training well and stuff so it is up to the manager, but he does have a lot of options in those forward positions.”
Southgate himself has moved to assure Foden he still has a part to play. He told ITV: “He is a super player. We think the world of him and he is going to play a big part [for England at the World Cup]. We love Phil. He’s a super player.
“He’s obviously been into the first game [vs Iran]. We decided not to put him into the second [vs USA] but he is going to play an important part in this tournament for us. There is no question about that.”
READ NEXT:
