Germany

(0) v (1)

England

 

 

 

UEFA European Under-21 Championship Play-Off second leg
8.15pm (7.15pm BST), Tuesday 10 October 2006
BayerArena, Bayer 04 Leverkusen
Live on Sky Sports

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Watford forward Ashley Young makes his first start for England Under-21s in Germany tonight and is aiming to help England qualify for the UEFA European Under-21 Championships.

Ashley has made two appearances from the bench for Peter Taylor’s men so far; his debut against Switzerland last month and the 1-0 play-off victory over Germany on Friday.

He now hopes England can get another win in Leverkusen to open the door to Holland next summer.

“It’s good to be involved, and I’m starting tonight as well, so I want to go out there and take my chance,” he said this afternoon after learning of Peter Taylor’s line-up.

“It’s an honour playing for England and even more so to play from the start, I just hope I can play well and at the end of the game say that we’ve won.”

He added: “I’m settling in well, coming into the Under-21s there are some boys I already knew anyway. Everyone gets along really well.

“It’s a different ball game playing international football as opposed to club football, but I feel good.”

At club level, Young was just 18 when he made his debut for the Hornets as a scoring substitute at home to Millwall in September 2003. Since then he has gone on to score 20 goals, including his first two Premiership strikes in the recent 3-3 draw with Fulham and he is now only six away from his 100th appearance.

“I’ve been told by the gaffer that I need to score more goals and scoring goals is what I like to do, so hopefully I can get a few more now,” he said.

“It could be going better but it’s started off fairly well, just the results haven’t gone our way. Confidence is high at the club and we have a good spirit, so the tide has to turn for us. We’re just looking forward to our next game.”

But before Watford take on Arsenal at the Emirates stadium on Saturday, the 21-year-old knows the importance of tonight’s game and expects England to be as determined to win as they were in Coventry.

“It was a very good display on Friday, we were well organised, everyone knew what to do and they did their jobs. We set out to get the win and that’s what we done.

“Everyone looks very good and we are all raring to go tonight, we want to go out there and get another win.” 

England starting line-up (click for profiles)
1 Scott Carson, 2 Micah Richards, 3 Leighton Baines, 4 Steven Taylor, 5 Anton Ferdinand, 6 Tom Huddlestone, 7 Nigel Reo-Coker (c), 8 James Milner, 9 Gabriel Agbonlahor, 10 David Nugent, 11 Ashley Young.
Subs: 12 Justin Hoyte, 13 Ben Alnwick, 14 Matthew Kilgallon, 15 Ben Watson, 16 Wayne Routledge, 17 Theo Walcott, 18 Cameron Jerome.

You can also follow the action in Leverkusen on TheFA.com or watch live coverage on Sky Sports.