I've Got Better Under Mcclaren, Says Gerrard

Soccer: Steven Gerrard has said this could become the best England team he has played in.

For almost a year it had looked as if the current set of England players might make history by being the first to miss out on a major tournament since the bunch that failed to reach the 1994 World Cup. Such disgrace is still possible, but Saturday's 3-0 win over Israel has given Steven Gerrard the right to be hopeful. He argues that "if this team clicks" it will have "more quality" than he has known in seven years as an international.

Self-belief is needed if England are to beat Russia tomorrow and so edge into one of the Euro 2008 qualifying slots in Group E. It is 11 months since the side have felt buoyant. Glumness descended in the goalless draw with Macedonia at Old Trafford, a more deplorable result than the defeat to Croatia in Zagreb four days later.

Were Gerrard to foresee glory, medical attention would switch from his fractured toe to a suspected mental fragility. The country has had its fill of golden- generation rhetoric. "I know it's cheap talk," he admitted after dwelling on what could be achieved. "But it's obvious when I'm training with these players and playing with them. We've got to be better. We've underachieved of late. We need to deliver for this country.

"Obviously I want to play and be selfish, but a team plays well when there's pressure from behind the starting 11. It's getting to the stage where there's two or three people fighting for each position, so the people that are starting have got to perform to a certain level to stay in the team."

He has reasons to relish any challenge at present. He is captain of an upgraded Liverpool line-up that may compete for the Premier League title and the injured toe is ceasing to be a worry, even if the medical staff are telling him to expect the odd "ache and pain".

It is, of course, the resources at Anfield and elsewhere which give the Premier League its profile and, despite the fact that it is often the foreigners who bring lustre to football in this country, a victory over Steve McClaren's side is highly prized. "They're desperate to beat England," said Gerrard. "It's easy to say we're good and we're going to be good, but we have to prove it."

His claims for the merits of the squad mean he is forced to argue that getting to the quarter-finals in each of the past three major tournaments "isn't good enough". The narrow aspiration of overcoming Guus Hiddink's side tomorrow evening could seem a taxing ambition all by itself, but there were aspects to Saturday's victory that were heartening.

Injuries and a suspension had their normal input into the planning of an England manager but McClaren's line-up did not act as if it had been stitched together out of remnants. The display was tailored impeccably, with Gerrard and Gareth Barry looking like a long-established partnership in central midfield.

"The secret," said the Liverpool player, "is that we've known each other for a long time, from the Euros in 2000, and we're good friends off the pitch. So the communication was there from the off. The balance was right because he's left-footed and I'm a right-footer. It just seemed to work. We'd only worked on it for a couple of days before the game."

Barry will not now have to stand down tomorrow since Owen Hargreaves is injured. Emile Heskey's place may go to a returning Peter Crouch, but the struggle to make the line-up is one that has to be relished.

Although no one has ever ousted Gerrard, he feels that he has enjoyed a more favorable setting in the past six months. In a curious way, matters took a turn for the better on a horrible night against Andorra in Barcelona. With Frank Lampard injured, Gerrard was put in central midfield and he has not had to budge since.

"The manager's been great with me," he said. "He wants me to express myself in the way I do for Liverpool and I feel my performances have improved under Steve."

The traveling England support had been hostile even before kick-off in that away fixture with Andorra, which was goalless at the interval. It was, perhaps, the crucial moment in Group E.

"Believe it or not, I think the Andorra game was probably one of my hardest internationals," said Gerrard. "The crowd were right on us early doors and the team weren't playing well. We found it hard to break down a team who, with all due respect, we should be walking all over.

"There was a big rallying call from the manager but also from the leading players. It was difficult at half-time knowing it was 0-0 and it was a big three points that we needed. Teams need to go through situations like that to improve and move forward and we are definitely a lot stronger from that."

Gerrard, with two goals in the eventual 3-0 victory, was the largest part of the answer. Yesterday he had the luxury of reflecting on the merits of the two candidates for the place beside Michael Owen tomorrow, weighing Heskey's power against Crouch's "slightly better technique". Russia will give England more than that to think about, but it is healthy that England can once again be optimistic in public.

By Guardian Unlimited © Copyright Guardian Newspapers 2008