Carrick committed to England

Michael Carrick is pleased to be in the England set-up again ahead of the World Cup qualifiers against Moldova and Ukraine.

The Manchester United player – who asked to be left out of Fabio Capello’s England team in January and was not prepared to be on standby for Euro 2012 – returned to international duty in a 2-1 friendly win against Italy last month.

Carrick has played at least 28 English Premier League matches a season since joining Sir Alex Ferguson’s side from Tottenham in 2006 and having him available for selection is a bonus for current manager Roy Hodgson.

“I’m delighted to be here,” Carrick said.

“I made my decision (to not be available for selection) in January/February time under the old management (Capello).

“(But) when it’s taken away from you, you realise how special it is and what it means to be there.”

Despite being 31 years old, Carrick believes he can have a good career for England for many years to come.

And he says he takes inspiration from his team-mates at club level, Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes, who are aged 38 and 37 respectively and still playing well enough to be regulars for the Old Trafford outfit.

“I think the peak years of players, because of the way we’re looked after, the way we look after ourselves, is nudging a bit further on in people’s careers and hopefully my best years are still ahead of me,” he said.

“I look at people like Scholesy (Scholes) and Giggsy (Giggs) close to home for me and they’re still playing some great football in their later 30s, so that gives me enough inspiration.”

In the first match of their qualifying process for the 2014 FIFA World Cup, England travel to Chisinau to face Moldova on Friday.

That looks very winnable for Hodgson’s team but a sterner test is likely to come against Ukraine, who England host at Wembley on Tuesday.