Back, slack MAGUIRE ADMITS POOR CLUB FORM IS AFFECTING ‘SLOPPY’ ENGLAND’S DEFENCE AFTER CZECH COLLAPSE
HARRY MAGUIRE fears club issues are having a negative effect on England’s beleaguered defenders.
Maguire, who became the world’s most expensive defender when Manchester United paid Leicester City £80million in the summer, has settled in well at Old Trafford, despite a disappointing start to the season by Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s men.
Danny Rose has suffered similar results at Tottenham after being linked with a move away from the London club.
And Everton keeper Jordan Pickford ( below) and centre-back Michael Keane are already fighting a battle to stay away from the bottom of the Premier League.
Despite Kieran Trippier ( far right) enjoying life with new club Atletico Madrid, there was a lack of confidence about Gareth Southgate’s back four in the shock 2-1 Euro defeat to the Czech Republic on Friday night.
And Maguire concedes that club struggles may be hurting international form.
Maguire said: “Maybe it is a confidence thing because we bring our club football to the international level.
“It was a difficult game. We started sloppy and we took the lead in the game when we probably didn’t deserve to.
“In the second half, we controlled the game a lot more, but we gave them a sloppy goal to win the game.
“So we do need to improve on that. It’s hard to lose any football game, but we were not at our best and got punished.” Southgate clearly has issues at the back. He changed his England defence for the 14th successive game – and saw his team’s 10-year unbeaten run in qualifying games crumble at the hands of a team beaten 5-0 at Wembley earlier in the campaign.
There had been warning signs against Kosovo last month, when England won the game, despite conceding three goals.
However, Maguire refuses to buy into the suggestion that England don’t have the personnel to defend.
He said: “I don’t know where this ‘run of shipping goals’ thing comes from, to be honest. When you look at the Kosovo game, we were 5-1 up after, obviously, making a mistake in giving them a goal early on.
“But maybe we just took our foot off the gas – and we do have to learn from that.
“We’ve conceded two against the Czech Republic, but, before that, we hadn’t conceded numerous goals.
“So I don’t know why this goals’ thing has started.
“We will work hard and try to improve, but conceding lots and lots of goals over the last couple of years is something we just haven’t done.”
Maguire added: “We probably need to tighten up at set pieces, but we’ve been really good at that over the last year, so we shouldn’t look into that too much.
“Obviously, the second goal came from us being a bit too open at a stage of the game when we could have consolidated the point we had.
“So maybe better game management would have helped us to, at worst, draw the game 1-1.”
England now ow face Bul ga r ia in n Sof i ia a tomorrow night, ght, with work still to be e done to guarantee qualification. fication.
But Maguire re believes Southgate can take positives from defeat t in Prague.
There was a debut for Mason Mount nt ( right), while Declan Rice and Jadon n Sancho also learned valuable lessons. s.
Maguire said: “It’s disappointing ointing for the younger lads in terms ms of the result, but it will be something they don’t forget.
“Mounty has made his debut – the first game of many, I’m sure – and he’s going to have a lot better nights ahead. But the defeat shows us that we’ve still a lot of work to go. .
“We’re still in a strong position sition in the group and now we have ve got to finish the job off.
“But we do need to nullify little areas to take into the Euros because, , if we do manage to qualify, we e have to rid ourselves of these e mistakes.”
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