John Stones admitted he was shocked to discover England captain Wayne Rooney was jeered by home fans ahead of Saturday's World Cup qualifying victory over Malta.
There was audible derision from some sections of the Wembley crowd when the skipper's name was read out ahead of kick-off and the maligned Manchester United man was also booed after a wayward shot towards the end of an unspectacular 2-0 win over a team ranked 176 in the world.
Rooney has been criticised in recent times for a perceived drop in form which has seen him lose his starting berth at United and move to a deeper midfield role for his country.
He operated there in Sam Allardyce's only game in charge of England in Slovakia last month and retained that position under interim boss Gareth Southgate.
Southgate oversaw victory in his first game at the helm and said afterwards that he did not understand the booing and that he had "no idea" how it would help Rooney turn his form around.
And Stones, who collected his 12th cap in the win, praised Rooney and said England's all-time leading goal scorer always gives his all for the Three Lions.
"I'm a bit shocked that that has happened to be honest," he said when he was made aware of the crowd's reaction to Rooney.
"I didn't realise that had happened. I thought Wayne was brilliant tonight and has been every time he has played for England, he wears his heart on his sleeve, gives 110 per cent, I think you can see that in every performance.
"In my opinion he is always up there, he is always on form, the top players are always going to get the stick that gets piled on them because of the standards they set.
"He has never dropped that once in the training or in the game and I think that is why he has been a top player for so long."
Dele Alli added the second goal after Daniel Sturridge had opened the scoring and the Tottenham midfielder was also perplexed by the reaction to Rooney.
"I didn't hear any of that but Wayne is a fantastic player, a big part of this team and he is a leader," he said.
When asked if the fans should be getting behind the team, Alli replied: "Definitely, it is always good to have the fans behind you and we have got to make a lot of things right as a team now and keep winning games."
Rooney came close to opening the scoring in what ultimately proved to be a frustrating evening for England, with Malta's England-born goalkeeper Andrew Hogg performing brilliantly to keep the hosts out.
Despite that, Stones praised Southgate's early impact since his arrival last week following the unsavoury end to Allardyce's 67-day reign.
"He let us have our freedom," the Manchester City defender said.
"He gave us a few points that every manager does, he wanted us to go and show in the game and he was always positive with how we wanted to play, got us on the same page and we all knew our jobs and responsibilities out there.
"It is never easy playing against 11 men behind the ball and I think we showed good patience and kept the ball well.
"It shows the work we did this week has paid off, there are always things we can work on and we will look to do that in the next few days.
"We knew in the second half that we had two goals and wanted to wear them down but not force things. The patience they showed, especially in the final third, was brilliant, we should have had more goals."