LONDON, Sept. 13 (Xinhua) -- England coach Gareth Southgate has warned that players need to be playing regular football for their club sides if they want to represent the country.
In an interview with The Guardian newspaper following England's 1-0 win over Switzerland on Tuesday night, the England boss explained the difficulties of having players who were not playing regular first team football domestically.
On Tuesday, Southgate fielded a side containing Fabian Delph, who has not played a minute for Manchester City this season, and Ruben Loftus-Cheek, who has just over half an hour of action with Chelsea this campaign, and watched as both struggled for rhythm in a poor first half.
Even Marcus Rashford, who scored both of England's goals in the international break, is not a regular starter for Manchester United, while Southgate also lamented the lack of game time 18-year-old rising star Phil Foden is getting at Manchester City.
"I understand the difficulties club managers have. They have to try to win matches. It is not as straightforward for Pep Guardiola as: "Oh, I'll just give Phil a game." Every decision you make as a manager has a knock-on effect and I understand how complicated that is. But it is a difficult landscape for us."
The England coach admitted that Delph and Loftus-Cheek had looked rusty against Switzerland.
"They are going to have the League Cup and European football, so there's more opportunity that the squads will get rotated," he said, adding a warning that they needed to play if they wanted to make his next squad in October.
"It's not my business to interfere with club managers. They have a difficult job to do and they have big squads in the top six, with huge competition for places," acknowledged Southgate, who singled Rashford out for praise.
"His confidence will be boosted with two goals against top-quality opposition. We have to give him time to develop. He has still played a lot of football, although maybe not continuous starts, and I'm really pleased for him that he leaves us full of confidence."
