Roy Keane and Ian Wright are both in agreement with Gareth Southgate's inclusion of Harry Maguire in his 23-man England squad despite suffering a dip in form for Manchester United.
While Wright noted the reasoning behind the United captain being picked for the Albania and San Marino clashes, he did admit that he would like to see in-form players get the nod as well.
Maguire's disappointing run of form has coincided with one of the worst Manchester United runs in recent history with the Reds winning just one Premier League game in their last six with defeats to rivals Liverpool and Manchester City among the run.
Keane, who has been critical of the Manchester United players and the Englishman in particular, feels that Southgate's trust in him is something a professional footballer welcomes when in a difficult run.
"You tend to show loyalty to the players who are good players, Gareth has missed players [in the past] who aren't quite up to speed at international and club level," he said speaking on ITV's coverage.
"But there's no doubting Harry Maguire is a good player. You always hope when you show loyalty to a player, you'll get it back and there's no doubt Harry's a good player. But he's having such a difficult spell, like a lot of other players, but loyalty is a part of the journey as a manager.
"He knows in these games, Harry with all his experience should be able to get through the games because you fully expect England to dominate possession and create chances.
"But it's part of the rollercoaster of a professional footballer and a player you do like the manager to back your corner."
Despite struggling for fitness in the early rounds of England's pursuit of a major honour in the summer, he did feature heavily in the remainder of the tournament playing from the draw against Scotland until the heart-breaking defeat to Italy.
Wright, who scored nine goals in 33 appearances for the Three Lions, understood Southgate's reasoning for remaining faithful in the England captain but did admitted he would have liked to have seen former Chelsea defender Fikayo Tomori included after his start to life in Serie A with AC Milan.
"It's fair enough for Harry Magure and Gareth [Southgate] will continue to say he picks those players, he's loyal to those players because they haven't let him down," the 58-year-old said.
"We saw he did that with Raheem Sterling, going into the Euros we saw he wasn't in great form. We saw the sort of games he put in.
"But, for me, you would like to see some players. When I was playing I always wanted my form to be good enough to get in there. So for these players, like Jarrod Bowen, Connor Gallagher - I want to know what I'm doing will take notice of that. Fikayo Tomori those kind of players if you're playing well but I totally understand why he picked Harry Maguire because he can trust him."
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