Aston Villa star who'd only played seven minutes for England 'got cabin fever' at World Cup

Former Aston Villa star Stephen Warnock has recalled how he'd only played seven minutes of football for England before Fabio Capello called him up for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.

The left-back made his way through Liverpool's youth setup before being offered his first professional contract at the club in 2002. Blackburn Rovers snapped him up in 2007, before he would make his way to Villa Park two years later.

Warnock would make 84 appearances for Villa between 2009 and 2013, and it would be during his time in the Midlands when he would receive his big break with England at a major tournament under Capello. Warnock was this week chatting about England at the upcoming Euro 2024 tournament in Germany on the No Tippy Tappy Football podcast with Sam Allardyce and Natalie Pike, when the topic of conversation turned to his caps for England.

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Pike asked: "Stephen, of course you were in the World Cup squad in 2010 under Fabio Capello, what was it like to be in that World Cup bubble?" To which he responded: "I was probably one of them names now if you were doing the squad announcement where it would have been 'he won't make the squad'.

"I was like the one who was the surprise to get in there ahead of Leighton Baines. I didn't play any of the warm-up games leading into the World Cup – I'd played seven minutes of football for England leading into that World Cup."

Allardyce asked: "Did you get a cap for that?" To which the star responded: "Yeah, you get a cap for that," before being interrupted by Sam: "You don't have to say you played seven minutes to anybody, you just say 'look at my England cap'."

The seven minutes that Warnock had enjoyed with England came in the form of a 3-0 victory against Trinidad and Tobago in 2008, when he would come on for Wayne Bridges late in the game. His second appearance wouldn't come until after the World Cup in November of 2010, coming on as a substitute for Kieran Gibbs in the 76th minute during a 2-1 defeat to France.

Do you think Warnock should have had more game time for England? Let us know in the comments.

And while the defender was happy to be taken to the World Cup in '10, the Express report he knew that he was unlikely to get any game time in the competition. He continued: "I was like front-row ticket, in the changing rooms, get to train with the players.

"I knew my role. I was sat behind Ashley Cole, the best left-back in the world. Between us we've got 109 caps but he's got 107 of them. So that is the problem."

He added: "I knew I was never going to play at the World Cup unless Ash got injured, and then that was probably the opportunity, but he never got injured." Warnock also explained that he got cabin fever at the tournament as a result of the England training base being far away from anything else.

Warnock said: "We were literally in a purpose-built complex for the World Cup and we got put in this area and there was nothing round it. We couldn't go anywhere. Sun City was about half an hour away, and we got to the point where we were like we need to go and play golf there, get us out, just get us out.

"So a lot of the players' wives who'd gone over were staying in Sun City, so it got to the point where every couple of days we were allowed to go out to see Sun City – and some of them would see their wives and some would play golf and things like that. And it was it was cabin fever – you're just on top of each other all of the time, so when we actually got out the group, we started to move about a little bit more."

England would crash out of the World Cup in 2010 at the hands of Germany in a 4-1 defeat in the round of 16. Goals from Miroslav Klose and Lukas Podolski, as well as a brace from Thomas Muller would send the Three Lions packing from the Free State Stadium empty-handed, with Matthew Upson's 37th minute goal all but a consolation prize as the tournament advanced.

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