Jesse Lingard called up by England for France friendly

England midfielder Michael Carrick sustained an ankle injury during England’s 2-0 friendly defeat in Spain on Friday.

The Football Association is waiting to hear whether England’s friendly against France on Tuesday will be called off because of Friday night’s terrorist attacks in Paris.

“That gap may always exist, we knew that and knew we had to work very hard defensively to stop them using that ability to create goal scoring opportunities, which we managed to do for the best part of the game”.

“We won’t know that of course until he’s had an X-ray or a scan, but it doesn’t look good”.

However, there is a slightly different feeling around England’s trip to Alicante to face Spain, with the need to face higher-quality opposition ahead of Euro 2016, given the relative minnows that provided the “competition” in Roy Hodgson’s ideal qualifying campaign.

“We’re not going to win every game. We’ve also got players such as Danny Welbeck, Daniel Sturridge and Theo Walcott out injured so it’s a huge array of talent and great for the country”.

“Until we get through the group stage, the last 16, maybe then I will start worrying about it”, he observed.

“We chose a tough one, especially tonight with the situation we found ourselves in but for 70 minutes we defended really well”, Hodgson explained to the media after the final whistle in Alicante.

Roy Hodgson is anxious about the lack of midfield options he has for England’s friendly against France.

England managed to carve out several openings but their finishing was poor and Gaspar’s goal gave a dominant Spain a deserved lead.

“Strangely the (first) goal we conceded was a Spanish counter-attack when we had good possession”.

“Obviously it hasn’t gone as well as it did last season for him but I think he is a fantastic player”, said the England skipper.

“Going into the game on Tuesday it’s a bit worrying”, the England manager said.

“It doesn’t matter that I didn’t score the important thing is that Spain performed well”, Costa, who has come under criticism from Del Bosque over his Premier League disciplinary problems, told reporters. But to win the game we had to do better.

“Spain are a world-class side, they keep the ball well, play good possession football, but we were well-organised”. The 34-year-old will return to Old Trafford to undergo further tests, but it is feared that the England global is set for a long spell on the sidelines.

As planned, Hodgson’s squad dispersed for 24 hours shortly after landing on home soil and will regroup at their Hertfordshire base on Sunday evening.