ENGLAND should consider changing their sponsors from Green Flag to Red Cross for this Saturday's friendly against Mexico.

With 13 players from his original selection either ruled out or struggling, England coach Glenn Hoddle yesterday drafted in Stan Collymore, Stuart Pearce and Philip Neville and admitted he had been naive to pin hope on an international game at such a critical stage of the domestic season.

Asked if it would not have been better to have held a training camp, Hoddle said: "If you could have got your crystal ball out five or six months ago when we had to make a decision to take the friendly and told me (about the injuries) I would have agreed with you

"We've just been unfortunate with the injuries we've got. The reasons behind having a friendly at this stage of the season are that my first four games were World Cup qualifiers and the first option on the fixture list was this date. "So it was common sense to have a friendly. There's a lot of players who are going to fall by the wayside because of injury.

"The only way for me to look at that is that there are opportunities there for other people, like Stan Collymore and Nicky Butt.

"It's probably ahead of their time but if they're in control of the shirt they've got a chance. So there's a positive side as well as the negative.

"If we get nothing else out of it, the experience these players will get will be a bonus for them. Whether they're ready or not is neither here nor there, they'll learn from training and playing at this level."