Sven Goran Eriksson and his team may be interested to hear that group rivals Tur

Sven Goran Eriksson and his team may be interested to hear that group rivals Turkey are not short on confidence ahead of our big match-up with them next year.

They currently head Group 7 with nine points having beaten Liechtenstein 5-0 last night and they are not shy about their belief that they can follow that with a victory over the Three Lions at the Stadium of Light.

Haluk Ulusoy, the president of the Turkish Football Federation, predicted: "We will do a first in England by beating them there. "There is nothing my players couldn't do if they want to. Our goal is to play in Euro 2004, play in the final and bring the cup to Turkey. "We are playing good football. We will go to the finish line as the first team in the group."

Turkey coach Senol Gunes said after his team's victory last night: "We reached our goal with good football, nice goals and we claimed three good points.

"We lost the tempo from time to time after going 3-0 up. It is very hard to keep up the high tempo all the time.

"We played with risks and gave chances to the opponent as well. It was an entertaining game. I congratulate my players.

"We can think of the England game now. We have time to prepare for this game in April 2003."

Sven is aware of Turkey's threat but he prefers to let football do the talking.

Of the group leaders he said: "Of course they have the advantage. But we can win the group. This result against Macedonia has just made it a little bit more difficult.

"It was a very disappointing result but as a performance I think for long periods we played good football.

"I am not going to cry about it - I want to fight for first place and I am sure we will do it."

April 2 2003 - A date for your diaries.

Visit the England section for all the dates of the Euro Qualification campaign.