Ben White Miss England Recall As Former Chelsea Player Returns to Squad

Ben White Miss England Recall As Former Chelsea Player Returns to Squad

Gareth Southgate has named his squad for World Cup qualifiers away to Andorra and home to Hungary with a couple of surprise omissions

Former Chelsea defender Fikayo Tomori has been recalled to the England squad for next month’s World Cup qualifiers against Andorra and Hungary but there is no place for Arsenal defender Ben White or Roma striker Tammy Abraham.

Gareth Southgate’s team are in a commanding position in Group I ahead of the double-header and the manager has stuck with a tried and tested group despite a number of key players being absent through injury, including Harry Maguire and Marcus Rashford of Manchester United.

Chelsea’s Mason Mount and Reece James are included despite missing last night’s defeat to Juventus with injury, while Ben Chilwell is left out due to a lack of club action.

Arsenal’s Aaron Ramsdale and Bukayo Saka are part of the group alongside West Ham’s Declan Rice and captain Harry Kane.

White, who was part of the European Championship squad but did not feature during the tournament, missed the September internationals after testing positive for coronavirus. He has made a fine start to life at Arsenal since an unconvincing debut away to Brentford and was expected to be included but Southgate will explain his decision when he speaks to the media this afternoon.

But instead, Tomori has got the nod. The 23-year-old won his only senior cap against Kosovo in 2019 and fell out of contention having struggled for game time at Chelsea last season. But the centre back has been impressive since joining Milan, initially on loan.

Abraham has also taken well to life in Italy since leaving Stamford Bridge for Roma. He has scored twice in his first six Serie A games and last made an appearance for the national team last November.