HART-FELT

England goalkeeper Joe Hart has hit back at criticism of his part in Leigh Griffiths’ freekick double for Scotland at Hampden, insisting that even the presence of “five Peter Crouches” in his defensive wall couldn’t have kept them out.

Hart chose 6ft 7ins former England striker Crouch as the imaginative analogy for his analysis of the technical difficulties Griffiths’ expertise from around 25 yards posed on Saturday evening.

“As a goalkeeper, you set up your wall and sometimes there’s just nothing you can do,” said the Manchester City man, whose club future remains uncertain after a loan spell in Italy with Torino.

“He [Griffiths] has produced two bits of quality. They weren’t curlers and, if you’ll excuse my technical goalkeeper chat, they were ‘heavy’. He put them over the wall and the ball then picked up pace.

“It might have helped for the first one if the wall had jumped, but it’s a case of ‘coulda, shoulda, woulda’. I ask my wall to jump, but not

“Iwanttowinandi’lldo anything for England, but sometimes you have to say ‘well done’ to someone”

JOE HART