Spain vs England preview: Wayne Rooney admits he faces ‘huge challenge’ to hold down starting place

Captain under pressure due to Premier League form of Tottenham's Harry Kane and Leicester's Jamie Vardy

Wayne Rooney has scored only twice for Manchester United this season (Getty)

The England captain, Wayne Rooney, says that he faces a “huge challenge” to maintain his place in the side, after manager Roy Hodgson excluded him for tonight’s match with Spain to assess Tottenham’s Harry Kane against elite opposition.

Rooney has been in indifferent Premier League form, scoring only twice for Manchester United this season, in contrast to Kane’s five goals in the last three league games and Jamie Vardy finding the net in nine consecutive league matches. Hodgson went to great lengths to assert that Rooney remained his “most important player” and that he would start against France on Tuesday – behind Vardy, if the Leicester player has recovered from a groin strain. He also has Daniel Sturridge, Danny Welbeck and Theo Walcott coming back from injury.

“Obviously, you have to understand I have played a lot of games for England and players like Jamie Vardy have come in and done well,” Rooney said. “If the manager needs to have a look to see what he can do at international level, so... you have to understand that. But of course… it’s a huge challenge to keep your place in the team and that’s what I want to do. I want to prove myself.”

Hodgson’s wish for a severe test of potential members of his European Championship squad will mean he starts Everton’s Ross Barkley behind Kane and may bring Chris Smalling and Phil Jones into central defence, rather than vice-captain Gary Cahill. In training, Hodgson also seemed to be assessing Cahill and Everton’s John Stones as a defensive partnership.

Hodgson said the tough pre-Euros friendlies would involve his side adopting a counter-attacking game, which they have not required in the qualifiers for France. “It is going to be attack-defence, attack-defence rather than attack-versus-defence, which it has been,” he said. “It might even be that we get many more opportunities on the counter-attack than we have had in the games we have had up to now.

“Counter-attacking football has not really been much of an option because the opponents have stayed so deep and had so many players in front of their goal. We think the type of players we have in the team are well suited to counter-attacking football. Barkley, of course, is one of those.”

England must beware the gamesmanship of Diego Costa on Friday night, though Rooney defended the Chelsea player’s conduct, which has earned him a three-game ban this season.

“I actually voted for Costa as Player of the Year last season,” Rooney said. “What Chelsea missed the season before was that fight up front and he gave them that and I strongly believe that’s why they became champions. He’s a fighter.”

Harry Kane will be given a chance against Spain (Reuters)

Vicente Del Bosque, the Spain coach, suggested that Costa should calm down. “Maybe he should smooth out his character a little bit and change some aspects of his behaviour, but we don’t want to change him,” Del Bosque said. “We knew what Diego Costa was like when we brought him over and we believe in him.”

The Spanish, for all their talents, find themselves at the centre of apathy towards the national team – despite having been installed as favourites to win the European Championship for a third successive time. Such is the indifference towards La Roja that they have resorted to playing in 30,000-capacity stadiums, which they can be hopeful of filling. They played at 16,000-capacity Logrono last time out and selected 30,000-capacity Oviedo before that.

Even on Friday night, one of the upper tiers of the Estadio Jose Rico Perez will remain closed on safety grounds, according to one stadium official. The British Fancy Dress Day in neighbouring Benidorm this week feels like a vastly more significant event, though Hodgson naturally sees things differently.