Crystal Palace Playmaker Courted By Nigeria, Eze Drops Out Of England U21 Squad

Published: September 02, 2020

Eberechi Eze won't add to his international caps at youth level for England this month, with the English Football Association officially confirming on Wednesday morning that the new Crystal Palace signing has dropped out of the U21 squad.

Young Lions boss Aidy Boothroyd has handed a late call-up to Brighton & Hove Albion defender Tariq Lamptey as a result of the unavailability of Eze and Chelsea's Reece James.

Arsenal winger Bukayo Saka has retained his roster spot for the European U21 Championship qualifiers against Kosovo and Austria on September 4th and 8th respectively.

The English Football Association informed that Eze has returned to Crystal Palace, however, he wasn't involved in yesterday's friendly against one of his former clubs, Millwall.

Nigeria Football Federation President Amaju Pinnick has gone all out to convince Eze to switch his allegiance from England to Nigeria but the playmaker requested to be given some more time to make his decision, with a focus on his club career much more important to him at the moment.

Nigeria offered the London native his first opportunity to play international football when he was invited to a Super Eagles training camp in March 2017 but he couldn't make his debut after a proposed friendly with Burkina Faso was cancelled.

A former England U20 international, Eze became provisionally cap-tied to his country of birth in November 2019, playing the last nine minutes of an U21 EURO qualifier vs Albania.

Ifeanyi Emmanuel

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