Manchester United have made a slow start to this Premier League season, but Kobbie Mainoo has a case to be their standout performer so far and has been rewarded
Nine of the 26 players who represented England at this summer’s World Cup do not feature in the latest squad Thomas Tuchel has named for the country’s upcoming Nations League matches.
Dan Burn, Dean Henderson, Djed Spence, Ivan Toney, John Stones, Jordan Henderson, Noni Madueke, Ollie Watkins and Reece James are not involved for various reasons. However, despite infamously being the only Three Lions player to have played no minutes in North America, Kobbie Mainoo keeps his spot.
There are also recalls for various players who just missed the cut, including Alex Scott, Cole Palmer, Dominic Calvert-Lewin, Jarrad Branthwaite, Jason Steele, Lewis Hall, Myles Lewis-Skelly, Rio Ngumoha and Trent Alexander-Arnold. Phil Foden, though, remains absent, six months after his last call-up.
Receiving a straight red card barely 20 minutes into last weekend’s Manchester derby will hardly have helped his case. Mainoo was one of the few positives for United from that defeat at Old Trafford, and the same can be said of their start to this season as a whole.
Twelve months on from Ruben Amorim only sporadically using the academy graduate as a substitute, Reds boss Michael Carrick has recently described him as “a real joy to have” and “a fantastic player”. Tuchel has also spoken highly of his conduct this summer.
“He didn’t put a foot wrong during the World Cup,” the England head coach said, “he was class in behaviour on the training pitch.”
Tuchel also acknowledged how difficult it was for him that Mainoo did not play at all in the tournament. The German said: “He got injured before the France game, so we couldn’t even give him minutes there, which hurt me.
“Maybe he was more hurt than me but it was my responsibility, and it’s my responsibility to reward him for that.”
Unlike that lengthy section of the press conference where Tuchel spoke about Mainoo, there was not even a mention of Foden. It is also no real surprise, either. Compared to Palmer, as he so often is, there is no debate. The surprise omission in this area of the squad was Morgan Gibbs-White rather than his fellow under-17 world champion.
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Foden has now gone over nine months without a goal for Manchester City. Enzo Maresca was still in charge of Chelsea at that stage of last season, with Amorim weeks away from losing his job.
There is also little clamour for Foden’s recall. Gary Neville clashed with Jamie Carragher during a debate about him in March, feeling compelled to call his fellow pundit an “absolute tool” at one stage. It is fair to say Foden’s absence no longer elicits such strong reactions. Carragher qualified his stance at the time by saying: “he’s amazing for Man City” compared with his relative struggles for England.
Foden then flattered to deceive in friendlies against Japan and Uruguay, while performances for City have also followed suit. Mainoo’s 14 is a long way from matching Foden’s total of 49 caps for his country; however, it is he who will almost certainly hit 15 before his fellow Mancunian brings up his half-century.
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