Serbia coach Radomir Antic has reduced his World Cup squad to just 24 players with Chelsea’s Nemanja Matic and Slobodan Rajkovic both being told they would not be heading to South Africa. They will join Dejan Lekic, Nemanja Tomic, Jagos Vukovic and Miralem Sulejmani in watching the tournament on television.

Antic has retained the services of forward Nikola Zigic and has tipped him to be one of the stars of the show in the southern hemisphere. The 6’8 giant has completed his move from Valencia to Birmingham City of the English Premier League for a £6M transfer fee.