England manager Roy Hodgson has questioned Liverpool training methods by suggesting Raheem Sterling's fatigue is becoming "ingrained in him."
Sterling was left out of the starting XI for his country's 1-0 Euro 2016 qualifying win in Estonia on Sunday after complaining of tiredness, according to Hodgson.
And the England boss has suggested that the issue may have arisen because the 19-year-old -- for whom the problem arose after playing 45 minutes of a 5-0 win over San Marino last Thursday -- is used to an extra day without training after club matches.
Liverpool manager Brendan Rodgers has declared that some of his players need two days without full training following matches.
Rodgers made that point after Daniel Sturridge picked up a thigh injury during an England training session on Sept. 5 -- the second day after he had played 89 minutes in a 1-0 friendly win over Norway.
Sturridge has not played since, although he is now back in full training and is likely to make a comeback when Liverpool visit Queens Park Rangers in the Premier League on Sunday.
Hodgson did work with the winger at club level during a six-month spell as Liverpool's manager, fielding him as a 15-year-old in a preseason friendly against Borussia Monchengladbach in 2010.
The England manager has always allowed players over 30 to have two recovery days after an international, but believes that Liverpool's fitness regime is not helping Sterling, who came on as a substitute to play the final 26 minutes in Estonia.
He told British national newspapers: "Raheem might say it is something that is becoming ingrained in him and that he felt the need to talk about being tired more than he would normally do.
"We have never had any problems with that [Liverpool's policy] but I don't think there is a lot of medical evidence to support the two-day recovery so, if you want to, you might want to research that.
"Certainly the Germans, who everyone admires so much, they don't do it, that is for certain.
"We did it from the start because we had people such as John Terry, Ashley Cole, Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard who I felt would be better off having an extra day.
"I would expect players not to take it for granted that there will be two-day recoveries.
"But on the other hand it could easily be like this time, when we did virtually nothing in terms of what I consider to be training the day after the San Marino game and only 40 minutes, including the warm-up, the day before the Estonia game, and that was at a fairly low-level intensity."
Sterling has played more than 3,000 minutes of football during 2014, having started all but four of Liverpool's last 33 league matches and played in all three of England's games at the World Cup in Brazil during the summer. That represents a significant rise in playing time for a teenager who, in 2013, made only one league start between the end of January and the start of December.
An ESPN FC analysis found that Sterling has already played more minutes this season -- 1,106 -- than he did up to Christmas a year ago.
Hodgson intends to speak to Rodgers about the issue, although he went on to suggest that he did not see it as a major problem.
The England boss added: "I think I should speak to Brendan but it really is very simple and I am sure he understands the situation.
"He [Sterling] has played a lot of games recently and it is the first year in the Champions League for Liverpool for a while, so the games have obviously been quite high-pressure games.
"Brendan has been talking about the pressures Raheem has been under and the fatigue that may have set in, so I am pretty sure he will be dealing with Raheem over the next month as he sees fair.
"Our record over my two-and-a-half years has not been too bad in terms of looking after the players. We don't send them back injured very often, though it is going to happen from time to time, and I think that is because we do have a very good medical and fitness staff and we do try to consider these things.
"But I thought there was a good question: am I the only one with that responsibility? Or does it have to be shared between club and country? I think it does."