Gareth Southgate has explained why he believes he has selected a balanced England squad for the Qatar World Cup.
In-form Arsenal defender Ben White has been included alongside Everton's Conor Coady, Tottenham's Eric Dier and Manchester City's Kyle Walker, who underwent groin surgery last month. Marc Guehi and Fikayo Tomori, who have been in recent squads, miss out alongside the injured Reece James.
In midfield, the headline inclusions are James Maddison, who has been performing brilliantly for Leicester, and Chelsea youngster Conor Gallagher, who gets the nod ahead of Southampton's James Ward-Prowse.
Newcastle striker Callum Wilson has been included ahead of the likes of Roma's Tammy Abraham, Brentford's Ivan Toney, Everton's Dominic Calvert-Lewin, West Ham's Jarrod Bowen, Aston Villa's Ollie Watkins and Manchester United's Jadon Sancho. Wilson has four caps for the Three Lions, but hasn't been included in a squad for three years.
"We wanted to make sure we got the balance of the squad right," Southgate said. "I think in this day and age the squad is more important than ever, with five substitutes you can now have half of the team changed within a game. You want different options for matches and for difference stages of the tournament as well."
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Explaining that he hadn't yet spoken to Wilson, Southgate said: "My priority on these days is the difficult conversations and the sad news and that is really tough.
"There are not too many situations in football harder than that - maybe releasing a young player at the early stages of their career - but the nature of those conversations, good and bad, reminds you of what it means to a player to go to a World Cup.
He added: "We've had to cover a couple of players who aren't fully fit, so having 26 available we've been able to take a couple of risks that you might not have been able to with 23."
Asked about choosing Wilson over Abraham, Southgate said: "Tammy's had a poor run of scoring form at the wrong time really. And it's not a case where we're three or four weeks away from the finals and the first match - we're now 10 days so form could be more important."
Full England squad for Qatar World Cup
Goalkeepers: Jordan Pickford ( Everton ), Nick Pope ( Newcastle ), Aaron Ramsdale ( Arsenal )
Defenders: Harry Maguire (Man Utd), John Stones (Man City), Kyle Walker (Man City), Luke Shaw (Man Utd), Kieran Trippier (Newcastle), Trent Alexander-Arnold ( Liverpool ), Eric Dier ( Tottenham ), Conor Coady (Everton), Ben White (Arsenal)
Midfielders: Declan Rice ( West Ham ), Jude Bellingham (Borussia Dortmund), Jordan Henderson (Liverpool), Mason Mount ( Chelsea ), Kalvin Phillips (Man City), James Maddison ( Leicester ), Conor Gallagher (Chelsea)
Attackers: Harry Kane (Tottenham), Phil Foden (Man City), Raheem Sterling (Chelsea), Marcus Rashford (Man Utd), Bukayo Saka (Arsenal), Jack Grealish (Man City), Callum Wilson (Newcastle)
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Missing out
Dean Henderson (Nottingham Forest)
Fikayo Tomori (AC Milan), Marc Guehi ( Crystal Palace ), Tyrone Mings (Aston Villa), Tyrick Mitchell (Crystal Palace)
James Ward-Prowse ( Southampton ), Ruben Loftus-Cheek (Chelsea)
Ivan Toney (Brentford), Jadon Sancho (Man Utd), Tammy Abraham (Roma), Jarrod Bowen (West Ham), Dominic Calvert-Lewin (Everton), Ollie Watkins (Aston Villa)
