Harry Maguire has admitted he and his England team-mates are struggling to get their heads around the new Uefa Nations League, despite being given a tutorial by manager Gareth Southgate.

England start the inaugural Nations League campaign against Spain at Wembley on Saturday, before facing Switzerland in a friendly next Tuesday night.

Southgate’s squad was further depleted by the withdrawal of Adam Lallana, who suffered a groin injury in training on Tuesday, following the withdrawal of Raheem Sterling with a back injury.

Despite losing two outfield players, Southgate has decided to call Fulham goalkeeper Marcus Bettinelli into his squad to join Jordan Pickford, Jack Butland and Alex McCarthy.

England are in Group Four of the Nations League, with Spain and Croatia. The four group winners of League A, which England are in, will advance to a mini-tournament to decide the overall champion next summer. They will also be in one of the small five-team groups for Euro 2020 qualifying.

Southgate has attempted to explain the new format to his squad, but Maguire is yet to fully understand it.

View more!

“It is quite confusing – I don’t know what you guys think of it?” asked Maguire. “The boss tried to explain it to us the best he could the other day. I think he has got his head around it now, but it took a lot of studying.

“It is confusing, but we are trying to get our heads round it. For us players, we just go into each game trying to win it and see where it takes us. So we will see after the game.”

This is the first time Maguire and his England team-mates have met up since reaching the semi-finals of the World Cup and the central defender admits he still feels the pain of the Croatia defeat.

View more!

“I still see little clips now and again, and you get that little bit of a buzz and you still have the memories, but I still have that bit inside me which is a bit disappointed,” said Maguire.

“It does make me feel a little bit gutted at times to think how close we were. We had one foot in the final of a World Cup so if you look back at that game it is disappointing. But then you look at the experience and what we did for the country, everyone getting right behind us, and it was something really special and something we want to do again in the future.”