Pearce ready for Romanian decider
Jamie Bradbury in Botosani
Monday, 11 October, 2010
The Coach believes his team are capable of handling the pressure in Romania.
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Stuart Pearce says his England side will be playing to win in Romania on Tuesday afternoon and will look to add to their 2-1 first leg win to reach the Finals next summer.
With a narrow advantage and 90 minutes of football in Botosani between the Three Lions and Denmark 2011, Pearce is determined to play a positive style to secure England Under-21s' third successive berth in the European Finals.
After a tough game at Carrow Road on Friday, though, his side will take a cautious approach, but will be looking to get an away goal of their own, following Ioan Hora’s deflected cross gave Romania a valuable goal in Norfolk.
“Every game that's in front of you, you've got to try and win it. We'll try to win the match,” said Pearce. “If in trying to win the game, we draw, and still go through, I'll accept that. But we have to go out and try to win the match.
“That's the way English players know how to play - but within that to go out and trying to win the game means being cautious. It doesn't mean gung-ho.”
He continued: “You know Romania played extremely well, getting players behind ball. It's probably the first time inthe ten matches we've watched them play that they've been so conservative. They'll have to come out and chase the game at some stage, whether at the start or later on depends on how the score line sits. That might just free up a little bit of space for us to really hurt them.
“It'll be in interesting game tactically that’s for sure.”
And the atmosphere on Tuesday may be tense inside Botosani’s 12,000-capacity Municipal Stadium, as both nations look to reach the final eight in European, but it’s a situation Pearce believes his team are more than capable of dealing with.
“We have had some high pressure games at the back end of the group stage and Friday night was high pressure as well,” he said.
“It was all or nothing. Now we have to go through that again. It’s the final match of four that we knew we had to face if we were to reach the Finals.
“We want to go to the party next summer. But it won’t be any different for us or the Romanians. Both of us want to get there as much and the prize is exactly the same. They won their group and we came second in ours. We have our noses in front and I am very confident in my group of players. “
“If we get a result here our spirit will be enhanced ten-fold, our confidence will go through the roof.“
The match kicks off at 2.30pm local time on Tuesday, which is 12.30pm BST, and will be broadcast live on ESPN. You can also follow regular updates here or via www.twitter.com/thefadotcom.