Harry Maguire has lifted the lid on the ‘awkward’ FaceTime call with Thomas Tuchel which ended his World Cup dream.
The Manchester United centre-half told The Rest is Football podcast that the England boss video-called all the players who didn’t make his squad for the tournament in the United States, Canada and Mexico.
After joining Gary Lineker, Alan Shearer and Joe Cole in New York for the Netflix show, he said: “He FaceTimes everyone… yeah, it’s quite an awkward call.
“It’s quite a unique way to do it. It makes it harder, probably, for himself to see our reactions.
“He said that he can’t really give me an excuse… but he’s gone with the four lads that he got through the qualifying in the autumn. He felt like they did well during them six games.
“But he did say that he can’t really give me an excuse. That’s football. It was tough to take.”
Maguire said Tuchel’s decision was “a surprise at the time”.
“I was really disappointed. I thought I did enough to be in the squad and I thought I could have helped the lads out there. I thought I would have still had a part to play on the pitch and off the pitch as well.
“But the manager’s made a decision and he’s gone with his 26 and it’s part of football and I’ll move on quick from here.”
On potentially missing his last World Cup chance, he said: “I was really disappointed. I wanted to go to the World Cup and play. I’m 33 now, so 37 at the next World Cup. It looks far away.
“So I wanted to go, not just play, but like I told the manager, I wasn’t demanding to go and start the games. I’d have been happy to play one minute as long as I was there with the lads. So no, it was disappointing.”
The show also discusses England’s chances, the importance of Jordan Henderson, and what Jude Bellingham is really like behind the scenes.
Watch The Rest Is Football every day on Netflix at 6am GMT: https://www.netflix.com/title/