England News

• Nickname:Three Lions
• Founded: 1872
• Manager:Roy Hodgson

• Ground:Wembley Stadium
• Capacity:90000

Lamps brushes off criticism

07 Oct 2008 - 15:01:05

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England midfielder Frank Lampard believes the team performance is much more important than his much-criticised partnership with Steven Gerrard.

Coach Fabio Capello is reportedly set to pair the two central midfielders together again when England take on Kazakhstan in Saturday's World Cup qualifier at Wembley.

The duo have struggled to recapture their impressive club form when playing alongside each other at international level, but Lampard insists the issue is not on the minds of either player in the build-up to an important game.

Liverpool skipper Gerrard was absent through injury when England secured a 4-1 qualifying victory over group favourites Croatia in Zagreb last month.

"It's very important to talk about the team - we can look into the wrong issues," claimed Lampard.

"We're breaking it down much too much. I'm not trying to find issues with certain players. We haven't really done quite what we could do over the last couple of years.

"We've been playing at a high level for our clubs and people expect the same for England and it doesn't always happen.

"But the Croatia performance shows that when we play as a team that is what is important.

"The manager is focused on that very much. The manager will pick the team and the players are there to play as a group. If you look too much into things you can find problems."