Stuart Pearce said St. George's Park is a dream come true as he spent Sunday morning running the rule over a group of grassroots coaches.

The McDonald's Community Awards Coach of the Year assessment session was held at The FA's new National Football Centre, where the England Under-21s Head Coach was judging seven budding coaches.

Pearce will be joined in Burton upon Trent on Monday by his Three Lions squad as they build up for their final two Euro 2013 Qualifiers, but was delighted to catch up with the grassroots volunteers.

He, along with Ray Wilkins and Eric Harrison, were part of the McDonald's judging panel to watch the sessions for local Staffordshire youth teams delivered by the Coach of the Year hopefuls.

"To be here on a Sunday morning to watch hopefully the next generation of footballers being coached by some bright young coaches is fantastic. That’s what this is all about," said the former England left-back.

"St. George's Park is everything we dreamed about. When I first came into the organisation five years ago I spoke to the board about why we should have an institution like this up and running.

"We don't want it to be elitist here, by any means. I think it was always mooted that we didn’t want it to become a training centre solely for the Senior National Team.

"We wanted all age groups and the community here. The club sides to use the facility and everyone to be inspired by football.

"Not only football, other sports as well have shown a keen interest in coming here to use the facilities and share ideas, and that can only bode well for British sport."

And Pearce also had a word for the young coaches, all vying for the McDonald's Community Award honour.

One of the main purposes of St. George's Park, as home of The FA's Football Development arm, FA Learning, is to help English football produce and develop more, and better, coaches. It is then hoped this will increase the quality of players coming through youth football.

After seeing the coaches in action on Sunday, helping to bring to life this vision, Pearce says the support going forward is vital.

"If we get that wrong you’re not going to inspire young players to be footballers," he said. "It’s important we back our young coaches and what they do at the younger age groups.

"I’ve never coached under-16s, it’s a really specialised area, and I'd find it difficult to do a job similar to some of the people here today. They have a real affection with young players and have that ability to inspire them. I have to take my hat off to them."

For more information on St. George's Park, or to find out how you could get on the coaching ladder, click here.