Pulis talks up in-form Crouch

Stoke City manager Tony Pulis says it is up to Roy Hodgson to decide if Peter Crouch is worthy of a recall to the England national set-up.

Crouch scored both goals as Stoke defeated Swansea City 2-0 at home in the English Premier League on Saturday.

The 31-year-old striker has been in impressive form early in the season, leading to calls for him to be included in the squad for England’s next World Cup qualifiers against San Marino and Poland next month.

“I’m not reluctant (to talk about Crouch and England), but Roy has a lot of experience and the last thing I want to do is tell him what team to pick,” Pulis said.

“It has to be up to him. I don’t think Peter can do any more than score goals and play well, and you have seen him today – in the first half he was unplayable.”

According to Pulis, Stoke struggled to match their early dominance after the break at the Britannia Stadium, before wresting control of the contest back from the visitors late in the game.

“I thought in the first half we were very good,” he said.

“The worst thing that happened was half-time – we came out very slow and sloppy in the second half and Swansea controlled the play.

“But we got back into it in the last 20 minutes and I’m just disappointed Crouchy didn’t get his hat-trick.”

Swansea’s Ben Davies received a yellow card for diving in the box 10 minutes into the second half, and his manager Michael Laudrup feels the defender may have been unfortunate not to earn the spot-kick.

“From the bench it seemed like he was touched and that it was a penalty, but having seen it a couple of times more, I have more doubts,” he said.

“I don’t think we have to go into arguing about whether it’s a penalty or a yellow card. It can be in between – it is possible that it’s not a penalty and you don’t have to give a yellow card.

“In this case, the referee thinks Ben is trying to dive and gives him a yellow card. All I can say is that this is a 19-year-old boy and I don’t think he has that in him. I don’t think he tried to dive.”