England Under-21s v Czech Republic
2007 UEFA European Under-21 Championship
Gelredome, Arnhem
5.15pm (UK time), Monday 11 June 2007

Stuart Pearce is backing his young Lions to build on their recent 5-0 thrashing of Slovakia when they begin their European Under-21 Championships campaign against the Czech Republic in Arnhem, on Monday.

The squad touched down in the Netherlands in confident mood after their emphatic friendly victory on Tuesday evening, but Pearce believes that his team can still improve as they go in search of European glory.

"I didn’t feel we did particularly well in the first half against Slovakia, we didn’t dictate the tempo well enough," said Pearce.

"I thought we did it well enough in the second half and the difference was that we got four goals in the second half compared to the first half. You can always improve and we’ll look to do that by getting the players on the training pitch and getting the flight out of our legs.

"Myself and the coaches will sit down and look at the video of the Slovakia game in depth and see if there’s anything we can draw from it. We’ll outline that to the players and then it’s a case of getting to know your surroundings and getting into the mode for tournament football."

Apart from facing the likes of the Czech Republic, Serbia and Italy, England may also have to negotiate the soaring temperatures that have swept across the Netherlands. With temperatures above 30c in much of the country, Pearce expects his players to take care of themselves but is not worried about his side wilting in the heat.

"I don’t think the heat will affect our training greatly, common sense will prevail. We won’t be sitting it out in the sun - it’s one of the biggest energy-sappers for footballers and we’ll make that clear to them. But they know that, they’re experienced pros. The games have late kick-off times so I don’t think it will be a problem, but we weren’t expecting hot weather like this."