Harry Maguire has revealed his ankle injury is “improving and getting better” as he fights to be fit for England’s European Championship campaign.
The 28-year-old central defender has been sidelined since picking up the knock during Manchester United’s Premier League win at Aston Villa on May 9.
He missed United’s defeat to Villarreal in the Europa League final last week and England boss Gareth Southgate has admitted it will be a “tight” call on whether Maguire can be involved at Euro 2020, with the Three Lions kicking off their group games against Croatia on June 13.
Despite his end-of-season absence, Maguire was included in the final 26-man squad for the tournament and he is concentrating on getting back to full fitness “as soon as possible”.
“The fear that I had was missing everything,” he told The Sun.
“I knew it was quite a bad injury. When I got the results of the scan, I knew it would be unlikely I would make the Europa League final — but we also never ruled it out.
“I would jump out of bed and put weight on my ankle, which I probably should not have done, and test it to see if the pain was still there. Every morning I woke up wishing the pain would be gone. Unfortunately, it was not to be.
“I knew for me to start the Europa League final was very unlikely but I hoped to play some part. However, it was out of reach and just not possible. Ahead of the final, I could still not run on the ankle. But it is now improving and getting better, so I am just looking forward to the Euros.
“I generally try to play through injuries. I know it was not the impact of the challenge at Villa that caused it. It was more of a twist, so when I did that, I knew it would be some sort of ligament damage. And obviously it was really bad timing for myself.
“To play so many games on the spin and not get many injuries, but to then miss the Europa League final and the end of the season for Manchester United, was disappointing for the club and myself.
“I have not picked up many knocks. You have freak tackles, people falling on you, you twist things, but I have avoided muscle injuries. But I am looking forward to getting back as soon as possible.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here