England will be without a key player for a warm-up match ahead of Euro 2024
(Image credit: Alamy)
England manager Gareth Southgate will have to contend with a disruption to his squad's preparations ahead of Euro 2024, with a key player guaranteed to miss their first warm up match.
On June 3, England face Bosnia and Herzegovina at St. James' Park in their first of two warm-up games ahead of Euro 2024, before heading south to take on Iceland at Wembley four days later.
With the Premier League concluding on May 19, the majority of the England squad will have four full weeks to prepare for their first Euro 2024 group match against Serbia on June 16, while players competing in the FA Cup final on May 25 will still have over three weeks.
England will hope to go all the way in Germany (Image credit: Getty Images)
One of Harry Kane or Jude Bellingham won't have that much time, however, with one of the duo guaranteed to reach the Champions League final on June 1, with Bayern Munich taking on Real Madrid in the semis.
Arguably England's two most-important players, Southgate will be fretting over the fitness of whoever plays in Europe's showpiece game at Wembley, with one of the pair's involvement against Bosnia already ruled out.
That factor could, naturally, have an adverse affect on England getting ready for the international tournament in Germany, with tactics and personnel having to accomodate the absence of either Kane or Bellingham.
One of Bellingham and Kane are guaranteed to miss the start of England's Euro 2024 training camp (Image credit: Getty Images)
Eric Dier and Jadon Sancho are also in with a chance of playing in the Champions League final, though it's unlikely Southgate will select either of them having left the pair out of his latest squad for March's friendlies against Belgium and Brazil.
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In those games, England lost 1-0 to Brazil before clawing back a draw in the game against Belgium. While results didn't go the Three Lions' way, the bookmakers still believe that England are the favourites heading into Euro 2024.
Ryan is a staff writer for FourFourTwo, joining the team full-time in October 2022. He first joined Future in December 2020, working across FourFourTwo, Golf Monthly, Rugby World and Advnture's websites, before eventually earning himself a position with FourFourTwo permanently. After graduating from Cardiff University with a degree in Journalism and Communications, Ryan earned a NCTJ qualification to further develop as a writer while a Trainee News Writer at Future.
