Peacock's pride
Tuesday, 05 July, 2011
Head Coach speaks about World Cup exit and reflects on his players' season.
England U17s Head Coach John Peacock saw his side's World Cup dreams broken by Germany for the second time in four years, but he couldn't hide his pride at what has been an otherwise successful campaign for his players.
The Young Lions have been a busy bunch this season, reaching the semi-final of the European Championship in May, before travelling out to Mexico for the World Cup just a few weeks later to reach the Quarter Final.
Unfortunately, they couldn't extend their season any further but they certainly gave it a good go against Steffen Freund's German side coming back from 3-0 down to have their opposition in a panic for the last ten minutes.
"First of all congratulations to Germany, I think you saw a fantastic game of world youth football today," said Peacock after the game.
"I’m obviously very disappointed but I am also very proud of my players, I thought we played well in the first half but unfortunately we found ourselves two goals down. I said to my players at half-time the next goal was crucial.
"I think the defining point of the match was when Chalaboh had his overhead kick fantastically saved by the German goalkeeper and they went up the other end and scored.
"We showed a tremendous amount of character from going three goals behind, and it was fitting how we finished the game in a strong fashion.
"The German team are very good at defending in the middle third where they counter excellently. They have some very good players in attack and they made us pay scoring two quick fire goals in the first-half.
"After this we did continued to play the game in the right way, but we just couldn’t find that crucial goal in the first-half."
The game brings an end to U17s football for this group of players and they will now be hoping to continue their development with the U18 and U19 teams over the next few seasons whilst Peacock prepares to welcome a new batch of U17s in August.
"I am very proud of all my players, we have played extremely well in this tournament in many different weather conditions and my players will improve from this experience there is no doubt about that," he added.
"I would just like to the say the crowd were fantastic today and the Mexican people have been very welcoming to us throughout the tournament so I would like to say I big thank you to them."