James injury struggle boosts England
DELE ALLI believes he was born to play in the World Cup.
And as the pressure begins to bite for Gareth Southgate’s Three Lions, Tottenham star Alli has revealed he will take to the pitch against Colombia in Tuesday’s last-16 showdown knowing Russia 2018 is his natural playground.
The 22-year-old midfielder – fit again after picking up a thigh injury – has been working towards this moment all his life.
And he insists he will take the pressure in his stride – even though he sometimes has to pinch himself at his meteoric rise.
He said: “I believe I am ready. I feel like this is where I should be. Every situation and decision I’ve made is to get to this level.
“Growing up as a kid you want to be playing at the World Cup and in the Champions League, the best competitions in the world.
“I’ve said many times before, there are moments you can’t believe it’s happening.
“At the same time, I’ve been playing a long time now.
“I was over the moon to be from a thigh injury he picked up in the opening game against Tunisia and is in line to return for Gareth Southgate.
But his Colombian counterpart Pekerman is planning without having Rodriguez available.
Rodriguez, 26, underwent a selected and I’ve been working as hard as I can to help the team, so I’m not going to take it for granted. I’m still fighting every day to get into the team and prove myself as a player.
“The World Cup is the highest level. The best teams and players playing against each other.
“But for me and as a team, we’re not scared of anyone. We’re not going to hide.
“We’re confident in ourselves and will go out there and perform to the level we know we can.”
England have a shocking record in knockout games with just one scan to discover the extent of the damage – and Pekerman has been told that it would be a huge risk to play him in the match against England.
The Barcelona forward – who spent last season on loan at Bayern Munich – was the star of the tournament four years ago, weighing in with six goals and two assists as sudden-death tournament win in 12 years – a 1-0 win over Ecuador thanks to a David Beckham freekick in Stuttgart at the 2006 World Cup in Germany.
But Alli is confident he will control the pressure of delivering victory over a tough Colombian team, who are sweating on the fitness of playmaker James Rodriguez who is struggling with a calf injury.
Alli added: “Every player handles different situations in different ways. For me, the only pressure is that which I put on Colombia reached the quarter-finals.
But when he arrived in Russia he was already carrying a calf problem which meant he was unlikely to start the first game for Colombia.
Pekerman left him out of the opening game against Japan, but a 2-1 defeat forced him to ask Rodriguez to play myself. I know how big the game is. I want to do as well as I can, if I’m in the starting XI or coming on. I want to do as well as I can.”
The mantra from the England camp all the way through so far has been one step at a time, even though finishing second in Group G meant avoiding Brazil in the quarter-finals.
But Alli is allowing himself to dream big.
He said: “I was dreaming about winning the World Cup before I was here, so it’s hard not to.
“But if we’re going to perform well, and as well as we can, then we can’t afford to look beyond the next game. We can’t afford to look too far into the future.
“Winning the World Cup is possible, of course. We came here with the mentality that we want to win it and we’re going to win it. But we can’t get carried away.
“There have been positives and we’ve been playing well, but we have to focus on Colombia and not think about how well we’ve been doing in previous games or how good we’re doing.
“We can’t get carried away. We have to perform well and, if we do, we’re confident we can beat anyone.” through the pain barrier during the 3-0 victory over Poland.
When Colombia then beat Senegal to move into the last 16, Rodriguez lasted just 30 minutes.
He was clearly struggling with his fitness before kick-off and it seems he has aggravated his original injury.