The England assistant manager Steve Holland has apologised to the squad for inadvertently appearing to reveal Gareth Southgate’s proposed lineup for Sunday’s World Cup Group G fixture against Panama.

Holland had been photographed walking on to the training pitch for Thursday’s session at Spartak Zelenogorsk’s stadium clutching a sheet of paper upon which seemed to be written the starting XI for the game in Nizhny Novgorod. On it, Southgate’s first-choice selection, which included Marcus Rashford and Ruben Loftus-Cheek, appeared to be detailed in formation with each player’s understudy listed underneath.

Although the Football Association was apparently relaxed about the situation, the England defender Kyle Walker said that Holland had felt moved to address the squad before their session back in Zelenogorsk on Friday morning.

“It was just before training, just before we went out and did our warm-up,” he said. “He gave his apologies and said it was the first time he had messed up in 20 years, which we had a bit of a laugh about because his refereeing skills are not great. It was a bit of banter, we move on and are looking forward to the game now.”

Rashford and Loftus-Cheek are, indeed, expected to start against Panama but Walker insisted Southgate had yet to confirm to the players his selection for the second game, when England could potentially secure a place in the knockout phase.

“We don’t know the team,” he said. “If I thought that was the team I’d say: ‘OK, it’s not really helped us, guys.’”

Southgate was critical of the decision to publish photographs of the apparent team-sheet. “Obviously any time, if we were to give the opposition the opportunity of having our team it’s a disadvantage to us,” he said. “So of course our media has to decide if they want to help the team or not.” Dele Alli, who was listed as “medical” on Holland’s paper, continues his rehabilitation from a thigh strain suffered during the win against Tunisia.