U Fools - Pearce: We won't win World Cup unless you take U-21 seriously

Posted Saturday, June 08, 2013 by thesun.co.uk

STUART PEARCE has told his FA bosses that England will never win another World Cup until they start taking the Under-21s seriously.

The Young Lions boss made the warning after losing THIRTEEN players before naming his 23-man Euro 2013 squad.

Pearce’s kids lost 1-0 to Italy in their Group A opener on Wednesday.

They must now get a positive result against Norway tomorrow to keep their semi-final dream alive.

Pearce said: “I’ll tell you what you need to be successful. You qualify with your best players. You take your best team to the tournament.

“The statistics back that up. We’ve done a study over the last 10 years. How many of our top 50 players in the senior squad have got tournament experience before they get there?

“It is whether you want to ignore the stats and think it doesn’t matter, we will just turn up and win a World Cup.

“Or do you want to put the building blocks in place?”

Pearce wanted to name Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Phil Jones and Danny Welbeck but they were included in Roy Hodgson’s senior squad for two friendlies.

He added: “I could name 13 players that could have been here. I also had two suspended and two injured. What do you think the result would have been if we took 17 players out of the Italian squad?”

In Group B last night Spurs ace Lewis Holtby scored for GERMANY but his side lost 3-2 to a late HOLLAND winner. SPAIN beat RUSSIA 1-0.