Peter Crouch made no secret of his emotions following his omission from the England squad for the games against Moldova and Ukraine.
And he sent Roy Hodgson a timely reminder of what he is missing out on by scoring the opener in Stoke’s well earned draw against Manchester City at the weekend.
The omission of Crouch is a little strange to say the least. With no Wayne Rooney or Andy Carroll, a gap emerged in the England set up that many expected Crouch to fill.
Yet Hodgson, who hasn’t selected Crouch whatsoever so far, continued to overlook the Stoke striker, and England looked short of options up front as they struggled to a scarcely deserved draw against Ukraine, relying on a late Lampard penalty.
Now I’m not claiming that Crouch should be a guaranteed starter for England, far from it. But it makes little logical sense to me to not have him in the squad at all. At 1-0 down to Ukraine, England badly needed an alternative tactic, and Crouch would have provided just that.
It has surfaced in the past couple of days that Crouch had refused to be part of England’s pre Euro 2012 friendly games against Norway and Belgium after Hodgson had confirmed he wasn’t going to be selected for the Euro 2012 squad.
