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21st Mar 2017

This special handshake between Jesse Lingard and John Stones is ‘why England lost to Iceland’

Here we go again...

Simon Lloyd

Slow news day? Nah, not one bit of it.

If the last few weeks have taught us anything about football supporters, it’s that they bloody love talking about the relatively recent craze of footballers devising their own special handshakes.

Barely a couple of weeks on from all that fuss about Harry Kane and Dele Alli’s celebratory handshake during a Tottenham game against Everton, we’ve been treated to another magnificently choreographed handshake during an England training session.

This time, there’s not a Tottenham player to be seen. Instead, Manchester United’s Jesse Lingard and Manchester City’s John Stones are the culprits, as the England players prepare for their friendly match with Germany in Dortmund.

Inevitably, the sight of players from both sides of the Manchester divide taking part in such a friendly exchange will prompt outrage from some of their clubs’ supporters. And as the initial reactions to it appear to confirm, it probably won’t go down too well with some England fans…

Some even went as far as suggesting that this sort of thing was the reason for England’s embarrassing Euro 2016 exit at the hands of Iceland.

Harsh, given that neither player was involved that night.

Catch up with this week’s episode of 888Sport Football Friday Live