Everton midfielder James Garner has echoed Harry Maguire's sentiments in voicing his frustration at being left out of England's World Cup squad. Thomas Tuchel revealed his 26-man roster for this summer's tournament on Friday, with both players among several notable absentees.
Tuchel has made several daring selection decisions, with Garner and Maguire joining the ranks of Cole Palmer, Phil Foden, Lewis Hall, Jarrod Bowen, Morgan Gibbs-White, and Trent Alexander-Arnold among those overlooked. John Stones, Dan Burn, Djed Spence, Jordan Henderson, and Ivan Toney are among the more unexpected inclusions.
Though the squad wasn't revealed until 10am on Friday local time, Maguire responded the previous day following a phone call from Tuchel. The Manchester United center-back, who has earned 66 caps for his nation, expressed he was "shocked and gutted" to be excluded, and now Garner has shared a comparable reaction, as per The Mirror .
Everton midfielder Garner said on Instagram, 'Gutted is an understatement,' in response to not making the World Cup squad -Credit:Justin Setterfield/Getty Images
"Gutted is an understatement. Good luck to the boys," he posted on Instagram, quoting an Everton post highlighting some of Garner's statistics and adding: "Head up Jimmy. You've shown your quality throughout this season - your time will come."
The 25 year old midfielder earned his first two caps in the friendlies against Uruguay and Japan in March, but has been omitted, with Henderson, Declan Rice, Elliot Anderson, and Kobbie Mainoo chosen in central midfield by Tuchel.
The German head coach revealed he met with every excluded player individually to outline his reasoning and acknowledge their frustration. "Very difficult decisions, painful conversations. Difficult for the players, difficult to explain to the players," he said.
"What we're trying to achieve as a team and we try to nominate a balanced squad. If everyone is selected, it was a given that from these 55 players, we have to leave some extraordinary talents, some extraordinary personalities at home.
To listen to the latest episode of 'All Out Soccer' - CLICK HERE
"Either way, if we picked all those names, some other big five names would have been out and we would be talking about these names. It comes with the job. I like these kinds of decisions, even if it sometimes took weeks and sometimes, months to clarify the decisions. I think they bring clarity. At the end, they bring a certain edge that is necessary.
"I try to explain for the players the reason they could be in camp. Did they do anything wrong? No. Could they be in camp? Yes. 100 per cent sure. But for some of them, it is just the amount of players in a certain position. We didn't want to play the players out of position so much and we wanted to give them a clear role and it comes with difficult and maybe hard choices in the build-up to the tournament."
