To go further insists boss Southgate
from Southgate’s youthful squad. But the goalposts have been shifting in recent days and even the level-headed manager has shifted his sights.
He told ITV: “We’re at stage where we could go home now, get a nice reception – we’ve won a knock-out game, a shoot-out – or we can go stages further and really have made a difference and created our own history.
“We said before we came we wanted to make the nation proud, a way of us behaving to do that, but we needed to win some football matches as well.”
Southgate also revealed that the enjoyment of fans back home was having a clear impact on the squad.
The number of travelling fans has been well down on recent tournaments, for a variety of reasons, but the celebratory scenes of supporters the length and breadth of England have not gone unnoticed in camp.
“The power of football to connect people can’t be underestimated,” he said. “It’s nice to see that people are happy, are talking about it at work and it’s a privilege to have that opportunity.”
“The players are excited because a lot of their experiences with England, they’ve felt isolated in camp and had to fight against the tide. They feel supported and a real collective energy.
“The players are responding to the warmth, the encouragement.”