England World Cup: Gareth Southgate offers update on Man Utd's Harry Maguire after Sheffield-born star's early exit

The spotlight had been on the Sheffield-born defender with his inclusion in the line-up cominbg off the back of a season in which he has barely played for Manchester Unted.

Southgate has never shied away from his faith in Maguire, whose performances for England have in recent times been consistently better than when in club colours, and the manager chose to play the 29-year-old in a back four alongside fellow South Yorkshireman John Stones.

Maguire had played well, albeit against a limited Iran side, but looked out of sorts when it was he who allowed Mehdi Taremi to break through and score England’s opponents first goal with the Three Lions 4-0 up at that stage.

Soon after, the Sheffield United academy product waved to the bench and after being assessed by medical staff, he was replaced by Eric Dier.

Southgate revealed afterwards that Maguire had already told staff that he wasn’t feeling right and, following the goal, the decision was taken to replace the defender.

Captain Harry Kane had also come off early after taking a knock in a heavy challenge.

“I think Harry’s fine,” Southgate said of Kane, who reportedly left the ground with a slight limp and his right ankle lightly strapped.

“I mean, it obviously looked a bad tackle but he carried on in the game and we took him off, really, because we felt it was a moment we could do that.”

Southgate added on Maguire: “He felt ill. He’d sort of flagged it just before the goal. Given the state of the game we felt no point carrying on.

“So, other than that, I haven’t really seen anything of concern.”