Euro 2016

Roy Hodgson unhappy with calls to drop England captain Wayne Rooney

By Pascal Lemesre, Football League Editor | 27 March 2016

Roy Hodgson will not listen to calls to drop Wayne Rooney, despite seeing his England side stage a remarkable comeback in Germany without their injured captain.

England manager Roy Hodgson has claimed that Wayne Rooney does not deserve to have his place in the Three Lions squad questioned, despite Saturday night's rousing win over world champions Germany without the Manchester United man.

England impressed throughout in Berlin and ended up coming from 2-0 down at the Olympiastadion in Berlin to stun their old enemies.

Rooney is sidelined with a knee injury and fellow strikers Harry Kane and Jamie Vardy, who have 40 Premier League goals between them this season, shone with two well-taken goals before Eric Dier's 91st-minute winner.

Although Rooney has only struck seven times in the league this season, Hodgson still believes that England's all-time record goalscorer will play a big part in the Euro 2016 finals this summer.

"It doesn't please me too much that it is suggested now that the moment he gets injured and doesn't play he gets jettisoned in some way," Hodgson told reporters after being asked if Rooney would now find it difficult to get back into the side.

"I haven't given a thought to that. I'm too busy enjoying the fact that Danny Welbeck came back and did well, Vardy came on and did well and Kane I thought was excellent throughout the game. I will enjoy that for the minute and I'm pretty sure when Wayne is fit and comes back we will assess the situation. I'm not spending any time thinking about that.

"I have to repeat, he is our captain and he has captained the team extremely well in the last two years. He took us through a qualifying campaign where we had a complete success with 10 wins out of 10. He certainly doesn't deserve [to have his place questioned] and when he comes back and he is fit again he is going to be putting enormous pressure on these players, just like these players will be putting enormous pressure on him, and that is the situation we are looking forward to."

One man unlikely to be available in France this summer for Hodgson is goalkeeper Jack Butland, who broke his ankle in Saturday's win.