Jack Wilshere has pulled out of the U-21 European Championships after a highly public row between Stuart Pearce and Arsene Wenger regarding the young midfielder’s possible overuse.
Stuart Pearce’s Squad For U-21 European Championships Announced
Goalkeeper doesn’t look that exciting, but Pearce should be able to count on a robust defence that includes the likes of Kieran Gibbs (an Arsenal player with a full senior cap, by the way), Phil Jones, Chris Smalling, and Micah Richards while his midfield features the talents of a number of Premier League regulars. Up front, the absence of Andy Carroll means that Dannys Welbeck and Sturridge will get to shine on a relatively big stage - it’ll be interesting to see how they fare after strong seasons on loan at Sunderland and Bolton respectively.
Read Article >Jack Wilshere, Andy Carroll Not In England U-21 Squad
While it’s easy to sympathise with the club when they say that Wilshere needs a summer off - his wages are paid by Arsenal, after all, it’s also extremely easy to point to that quote as an example of gross overuse by a player barely in him majority by the Gunners. You know why he’s tired? Because Wenger played him all the time despite his performance tanking as he racked up the games.
*Actually, this is a slightly interesting aside: Wilshere has been overworked this year and thus for fear of injury Arsenal didn’t want to include him in the U-21 squad, whereas Carroll has not been overworked this year because of injury. So including him, presumably, was totally, cool - until it turned out he was actually too injured to play.
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