Rio Ferdinand and Kyle Walker are both set to miss out on England's European Championship squad.
Ferdinand's flagging fitness the past few seasons has seen him feature sporadically for the Three Lions, with his last match coming against Switzerland in June 2011.
Sir Alex Ferguson, Ferdinand's manager at Manchester United, said only two days ago: "You play something like a game every four days [at Euros]. Rio Ferdinand couldn't do that."
Although he has been selected for three World Cup squads, Ferdinand, 33, has never played at a European Championship.
He was overlooked by Kevin Keegan for Euro 2000, missed Euro 2004 due to his eight-month ban for missing a drugs test, while England didn't qualify for Euro 2008.
The one-time England captain will be joined on the sidelines by Tottenham Hotspur right-back Kyle Walker, after he broke his toe in the club's clash at Bolton on 2 May.
Walker, 21, was named in the Premier League Team of the Year at right-back and won the Professional Footballers' Association's Young Player of the Year award. He earned his two England caps in November last year.
Surprisingly, Micah Richards has also been informed he won't be travelling to Poland and Ukraine.
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Richards played 37 games for Manchester City this season and was expected to make the squad alongside Walker as the second right-back.
However his omission makes it inevitable Liverpool full-back Glen Johnson will start in defence, despite defensively unconvincing throughout his career. Manchester United's Phil Jones, who prefers to play at centre-back, looks likely to travel as cover for Johnson.
The absence of Ferdinand has paved the way for John Terry's inclusion in the squad.
Hodgson was agonising over the Ferdinand-Terry selection quandary, since the Chelsea captain goes on trial on 9 July for allegedly racially abusing Ferdinand's brother Anton.
Yet Terry's own form has significantly dipped the past two seasons, and last week he endured a chastening experience up against Andy Carroll and Luis Suarez as Liverpool beat Chelsea 4-1 at Anfield.
The Guardian's Daniel Taylor has gone so far as to claim "a dismayed Ferdinand is convinced it {his exclusion] is directly linked to his issues with Terry".
The 23-man squad will be named at 13:00 BST on Wednesday.
