England v Slovenia LIVE: Predicted line-ups and build up as Gallagher set to start

England fans were again praised for their behaviour after no incidents of disorder were reported in the build-up to Tuesday’s final Euro 2024 group match against Slovenia in Cologne.

Police in Gelsenkirchen and Frankfurt were impressed by the conduct of the vast majority of English fans who visited those cities for the earlier games against Serbia and Denmark.

An update from the UK Football Policing Unit on Tuesday morning provided further positive news.

“Around 10,000 England fans gathered in Cologne last night, Monday June 24,” it read.

“There were no reports of disorder and no arrests of any England fans were made. This is indicative of what we have seen across Germany so far, with the vast majority of England fans behaving extremely well.”

England are guaranteed a place in the last 16 after Monday night’s results in Group B, but can still finish top, second or third in their group.

Shearer later added, “What are we meant to say?”, to which Lineker sarcastically replied, “That they were really good, Alan. They were really good, actually”.

Shearer also admitted: “It might have been that word ’s***’. The simple and easiest thing is, have England played well, or did they play well, in that game against Denmark? No, we were terrible. So, we have to say that. If England are brilliant, we’ll say they’re brilliant. That’s just the way it is.”

Lineker added: “Yes, we were critical and no one’s above criticism, and Harry will know as well,” before stressing: “It’s never personal. We’ve actually said we think, really, it’s come from the top, not the players, because they look a little bit lost on the pitch, tactically. Harry said it himself, cryptically sort of, didn’t he? ‘We don’t really know how we’re pressing as a team’.”

Lineker said: “Could you imagine if we went on and said, ‘Well, actually, I thought they played really well’? We’d be lying, for a start, because they didn’t play well. And Harry knows they didn’t play well.

“I understand where he says, ‘But they have responsibilities being ex-England players and they should know, they know what it’s like, it’s not like they’ve ever won anything’, or words to that effect.

“Fine. And he’s absolutely right. But I will say one thing, the last thing in the world we want to be is downbeat and critical. We want the England team to perform well on the pitch. The best punditry of all is when England play well and we’re excited and we’re enthusiastic about them. We don’t want to be critical but we have to be sometimes. We have to say it.”

“I’m not telling people not to do their job, it’s their job to analyse games and players. There will be games where I get stick or other players will get stick. Maybe when I’m 40 or 50, I’ll be on one of those shows trying to dig players out – I hope I’m not.”

He did suspect an ulterior motive, given Lineker’s most abrasive comments came on the podcast he hosts, run by his production company Goalhanger Podcasts. “People will do things for their own gain, that’s just life,” added Kane. “With podcasts and things like that, people are trying to promote their own channels.”

Lineker and Rest Is Football co-host Shearer then responded to Kane’s criticism on Monday’s edition of the podcast and refused to back down from their initial comments, although acknowledged that they understood the England skipper’s complaints.

“The bottom line is we haven’t won anything as a nation for a long, long time and a lot of these players were part of that and they know how tough it is,” countered Kane. “All I would say is remember what it is like to wear the shirt and that their words are listened to. I am sure they want us to win a major tournament and being as helpful as they can and building the lads up with confidence would be a much better way of going about it.

Harry Kane has hit back at Gary Lineker by telling him to remember he did not win anything with England after the BBC presenter called the current team’s performances “s***”.

England captain Kane urged his predecessor to consider the impact his words can have, especially on younger and newer players, and to realise that it can be impossible to ignore stringent criticism now.

Lineker and fellow pundit Alan Shearer were outspoken in their verdicts of England’s performance in the 1-1 draw with Denmark on both the BBC’s coverage and The Rest is Football podcast, and Kane believes they should have spoken with more responsibility and tried to be more constructive.

Gareth Southgate says England are “definitely making progress” in terms of fitness, as he said the build-up to the final Euro 2024 group match against Slovenia required “a reset button” and “open and honest conversations”.

The manager clearly hopes this game will be a watershed in the team’s tournament, after two poor opening performances that brought four points but also a lot of criticism. Southgate himself made a point of stating how a lot of that was down to the physical condition of the players, who he found couldn’t press in the way the team wanted. He stressed this is something that has improved over the last week. Southgate specifically pointed to the varying situations of Marc Guehi, Kieran Trippier and Harry Kane.

“We’re definitely making progress. If you think that when we got Marc Geuhi through the door, he’d had 70 minutes, that was the most he’d played for Crystal Palace in the last three months. Trips [Trippier] hadn’t had a 90 minutes for three months. Then we had Harry and others coming back from injuries as well, so two games in, with a bit of recovery time, all of those will be in a better place. That’s definitely going to help us as we progress through the tournament,” he said.

Declan Rice says James McClean’s criticism may have come from “bitterness towards me not playing for Ireland”, although he was keen to praise what he had thought was a good relationship with the retired winger. McClean created headlines as a pundit on Irish national station RTE, by describing his former international teammate as “overrated” and “not world class”, with follow-up comments on the passive nature of his game. Rice won three caps for Ireland in 2018, where he was a teammate to McClean, before switching to England.

The Arsenal midfielder was mostly conciliatory when the comments were put to him, albeit with one bite. Rice similarly referenced McClean’s comments from 2019, when he said those not “proud” to play for Ireland should “sod off and play for someone else”.

England XI: Pickford; Walker, Guehi, Stones, Trippier; Rice, Gallagher; Saka, Bellingham, Foden; Kane

Slovenia XI: Oblak; Karnicnik, Brekalo, Bijol, Janza; Mlakar, Elsnik, Cerin, Stojanovic; Sporar, Sesko

England have already qualified for the last 16 after Spain beat Albania 1-0 on Monday.

Gareth Southgate’s team already have a points tally of four, which will be enough for them to qualify as one of the four best third-place teams.

England cannot finish lower than third.