Former England and Liverpool midfielder Steven Gerrard says the weight of history has led to a culture of fear for England and that must change.
Writing in his Telegraph column, Gerrard insists that psychological impact of years of media bashing the team played a huge role when the team went 2-1 down to Iceland.
Gerrards says that while Roy Hodgson has paid the price for England’s Iceland failure, no players did themselves any justice in France. Despite this, the former Liverpool skipper is refusing to ‘jump on board this bandwagon attacking English players’.
‘I do not accept that the problem with English football is the players are not good enough,’ wrote Gerrard.
‘It is the same argument whenever we go out of a major tournament. The players are overrated, and the English Premier League is not as strong as it thinks it is.
‘Nonsense. You are telling me we do not have the talent to beat Iceland? That we lost because their players and their league are better than ours?
‘We were beating Germany a few months ago. Not only is the Premier League the most competitive in Europe, even if you argue La Liga, Serie A and the Bundesliga are superior, ours is a higher quality than most of the world.
‘We lost to Iceland, not Spain, Germany or Italy. I do not and will not accept that there is not a good England squad out there, or that the players are products of a poor league.’
