Sven sets out his defence

Sven-Goran Eriksson was forced to defend his handling of the Australia debacle today after the senior players wanted to turn around their poor first-half performance at Upton Park.

As Standard Sport revealed yesterday, England's top stars pleaded with the England coach to let them back out for the second half after a disastrous first 45 minutes saw them go 2-0 down.

But having agreed with the club managers he would not tire their players, Eriksson refused.

The Football Association are now planning to organise an emergency summit with the country's top club managers, including Arsene Wenger and Sir Alex Ferguson, to sort out the friendly fixture issue after widespread criticism that England's supporters, who paid up to £35 per ticket, had been short-changed.

Eriksson said: "I will defend using the players for only 45 minutes because it's the right thing to do. Some of the players came to me and asked if they could stay on for the second half. Beckham was the first but I said that 45 minutes was fair enough.

"I've talked before about whether it's time to stand up to the clubs. I can do that but I don't think it's fair. The Arsenal and Mancheseter United players are going to play in the FA Cup on Saturday and they'll play on Tuesday too. I'm not saying the FA Cup is more important than the England team, but you must understand this was a friendly."