Darts sensation Luke Littler has hit out at Gareth Southgate’s decision to select Lewis Dunk and leave Harry Maguire out of his England’s squad for Euro 2024.
England final 26-man party for this summer’s tournament was announced yesterday and Maguire was among the seven players cut from Southgate’s provisional squad, with the Manchester United defender struggling for fitness.
Maguire was absent for United’s last five games of the season due to a calf injury and there had been hopes he could prove his fitness to at least play a role in the latter stages of the European Championships, should the Three Lions progress that far in Germany.
But Southgate, renowned for his loyalty to certain players, decided against risking Maguire and instead named John Stones, Ezri Konsa, Marc Guehi, Joe Gomez, Kieran Trippier, Kyle Walker and Lewis Dunk at the back.
‘I am devastated not to have been selected to play for England at the Euros this summer,’ Maguire told his followers on X, formerly known at Twitter.
‘Despite my best efforts, I have not been able to overcome an injury to my calf. Maybe I pushed myself too hard, to try and make it. Simply, I am absolutely gutted.
‘For me, representing England is the highest honour. It means everything to me. If I can’t help the team as a player, I will support them as a fan – along with the rest of the country. Go and win it boys. Next, I will return to the supervision of the Manchester United medical team in order to prepare for next season.’
Despite his fitness struggles, the omission of Maguire – who has performed admirably for England at major tournaments – has raised eyebrows, with Southgate now left with inexperienced options in Germany.
Konsa, Guehi and Dunk have just 19 senior caps between them at centre-back and darts wonderkid Littler, a lifelong Manchester United supporter, clearly feels it was worth the risk to take Maguire on the plane.
Responding to an Instagram post confirming Maguire’s omission, the 17-year-old Premier League Darts champion said, ‘but Lewis Dunk gets in [see-no-evil monkey emoji]’, before replying, ‘lord help us [praying emoji]’, to a picture of the squad.
In his press conference on Thursday evening, Southgate hinted that Maguire could potentially have returned to fitness in time for the knockout phase but said there were ‘too many hurdles to get through’ for the centre-half.
‘The decision on Harry is totally about his physical condition and his recovery from the injury,’ the England head coach told reporters.
‘There is no other reason as he is one of our strongest centre-backs.
‘Harry has made some progress, but it’s been complicated and we wouldn’t have had him in the group stages. There were too many hurdles to get through without being clear where we might get to.
‘Knowing we haven’t got a clean bill of health across the rest of the backline, we need players who are fit and ready to go from the start.
‘It was a really difficult call, you know how I feel about Harry, what he’s done for England and for me as a manager.’
England – one of the hot favourites ahead of Euro 2024 – kick off their tournament against Group C rivals Serbia on June 16, before taking on Denmark four days later.
The Three Lions wrap up their group-stage campaign in Cologne versus Slovenia on June 25.