Harry Maguire will be going to Qatar, despite struggling for form and fitness with Manchester United, while Fikayo Tomori is one of the young defenders to miss out on selection, despite winning Serie A with AC Milan last season.
The likes of Eric Dier, Conor Coady, Ben White and John Stones will also be competing for places in the centre of defence, with Southgate sticking with what he knows and not gambling on players who have not been around the squad as much.
Asked about the selection of Maguire, despite not playing much in recent weeks, Southgate told a press conference on Thursday: ‘Physically we’ve had really good communication with all of the clubs on the training loads of all of the players,’
‘We’ve got to pick that up on Wednesday when we see them on the training pitch. We need to know who’s playing, what’s their load. Some have played less regularly. We’re picking up various fitness levels and we’ve got to get that right on the training pitch.
‘We’ve picked our more experienced defenders, we think the younger ones have got some really good qualities but we don’t think they’ve done enough to push the more experienced ones out.
‘We think the tournament we’re going into and the level of the matches, that needed to be the pecking order.’
Maguire has remained in Southgate’s plans over recent years, even going through a significant dip in form for the Red Devils, playing in Nations League matches against Germany and Italy at the end of September.
MORE : Rio Ferdinand says Gareth Southgate is placing ‘blind trust’ in Harry Maguire for England’s World Cup campaign
MORE : It’s decision day for Southgate as England manager names his World Cup squad for Qatar
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