England boss Thomas Tuchel says Declan Rice spent most of the three days before their World Cup quarter-final win against Norway in bed with sickness.
Rice started the 2-1 victory against Norway but looked like he was struggling in the stifling heat of the Miami Stadium before being substituted after the break for Arsenal team-mate Eberechi Eze.
England went 1-0 down when Andreas Schjelderup scored for Norway before Jude Bellingham equalised just before half-time, and also grabbed the winner for the Three Lions during extra time.
The win set up a semi-final against Argentina, who beat Switzerland, that will kick off at 20:00 BST on Wednesday, 15 July and be shown live across the BBC.
“We had some players struggling in the heat,” said Tuchel. “Ezri Konsa was one of them with cramps and the hamstrings.
“Declan, we made a decision in half-time to become more offensive, to have a bit of an offensive shift.
“I made the decision when we were 1-0 down and didn’t want to go back on the decision because of the equaliser.”
Rice was a doubt for the Norway game as he had already been suffering with a neural issue affecting his hamstring and lower back, and it was exacerbated by illness.
He trained on the eve of the quarter-final but made way at the break.
Tuchel added: “We had to take Elliott [Anderson] or Declan out [and] knowing that Declan struggled after the last three days where he was most of the time in bed, I knew he cannot survive 90 minutes.
“There was a possibility that it goes 120 [minutes], so I didn’t want to waste another change, so the decision was to take Declan out earlier than he needed to go out, just to save us another change later down the match.”
Rice, who helped Arsenal win last season’s Premier League title, has started five of England’s six matches at the 2026 World Cup, with the group game against Panama being the only one he has missed.
