England manager Terry Venables wants the Hong Kong Stadium management to break with protocol and allow his Euro 96 squad to warm up on the pitch instead of behind the goals tomorrow.
Venables insisted that his players use the full pitch for warming up just before their historic game against Golden - and not behind the goals, which is normal practice.
Stadium managers Wembley International (Hong Kong) Limited have ruled that all sides, whether local or visiting, can only warm up behind the goals in order to preserve the pitch's condition.
Wembley have already agreed to giving England one training session at the 40,000-capacity stadium this morning but they are worried more training on the pitch would damage the pitch even though two half-hour curtain-raisers are being planned before the big game.
The Stadium managers are expected to bow to Venables' demand although it is at the expense of the two curtain-raisers involving the Seiko '82 squad, the local movie stars squad and the Golden youth team.
'Venables said he wishes to warm up using the whole pitch as they would normally do in Europe. They want a good feel of the pitch before they play us,' said Golden president Simon Wan Chi-lok.
'Wembley said at first that this would not be allowed. Venables doesn't see the logic of that especially as the pitch will be used for two curtain-raisers and the pitch would take some damage anyway,' he said.