England star ordered to boycott ‘nonsense’ World Cup third-place game vs France

Former Manchester United midfielder Nicky Butt has urged Kobbie Mainoo to refuse to play in England’s World Cup third-place decider against France on Saturday.

Mainoo finished the second half of last season as one of Manchester United’s standout performers under Michael Carrick and subsequently earned a place in Tuchel’s England squad for their World Cup campaign.

However, the 21-year-old has not played a single minute of England’s World Cup run and has been left on the bench for all seven of the Three Lions’ matches so far.

Tuchel is expected to make several changes to his starting line-up for the game against France, which kicks off at 10pm BST on Saturday, and Mainoo is in line to be handed his first appearance of the tournament.

However, Butt insists Mainoo should turn down the opportunity to play against France because he has been constantly overlooked by Tuchel this summer.

‘I do not know what is going on there, there’s something not quite right with it,’ Butt said.

‘Now they’re going to play the bomb squad in the stupid third-place game.

‘I’d just refuse to play if I was Kobbie Mainoo. I’d say I was injured.

‘It’s a nonsense game, especially when you’ve been treated like that.

‘He’s not played a minute of football, now to go and start this pointless jumped-up friendly and potentially get injured for the whole season… no.’

Butt also believes the Football Association should sack Tuchel and claims Newcastle United manager Eddie Howe or Mauricio Pochettino, who guided the United States to the World Cup last-16, are both better options than the German.

‘There’s no way he [Tuchel] can stay on. Not a cat in hell’s chance after that,’ Butt said.

‘If he stays on, John McDermott [the FA’s technical director] needs to be sacked as well.

‘There’s no way you can keep him now. He’s not a Sir Bobby Robson or Kevin Keegan, someone that the nation loves.

‘You’re talking about a manager that’s come in and played negative football, crazy negative football, in the semi-final against a beatable Argentina team.

‘And it shouldn’t really matter, but people will go against him because he’s German as well, so he’s going to have a nightmare.

‘He’s an unbelievable club manager, so just let him go. He won’t want to stay. He might say he does, but deep down he’ll be thinking, ‘pay up, I’m out of here’.

‘If we were nine months down the line, I’d definitely be going for Pep Guardiola. But Pep can’t leave Man City a month ago, saying he needs a rest from football, and then go straight back in. He can’t do that.

‘Eddie Howe would be brilliant. I’d love him to go in, it’d be great.

‘Mauricio Pochettino’s got an unbelievable relationship with John McDermott and he picks it.

‘When McDermott was the academy manager at Tottenham, Pochettino was the manager, and they had a really, really good relationship.

‘I was in and around it with the Manchester United academy, we would do training camps there so I’ve seen it first hand.

‘I wouldn’t be surprised if that happened and I wouldn’t be against it at all. He’s a very, very good manager. A likeable person, plays good football everywhere he goes.

‘But we all said the same about Tuchel, yet when they go into that England dynamic, they just change, it’s crazy. I can’t put my finger on why.’

Nicky Butt was speaking exclusively to Paddy Power

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