England’s James Maddison suffers injury ahead of World Cup

England and Leicester City midfielder James Maddison was forced off with an injury in the Premier League clash at West Ham United only a week ahead of the Qatar World Cup.

Maddison opened the scoring in the game after eight minutes on Saturday but appeared to suffer a hamstring injury and was substituted after 24 minutes.

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It is a huge setback for the 25-year-old who received a dramatic last-minute call-up to England’s 26-man World Cup squad on Thursday.

Maddison’s only previous England appearance came as a substitute against Montenegro in November 2019 and he had not been selected since despite a fine run of form at Leicester City.

However, after a calendar year in which Maddison has amassed 22 Premier League goal involvements — only Harry Kane, Kevin De Bruyne and Son Heung-Min have more — England boss Gareth Southgate opted to include him in his travelling party to Qatar.