Ferdinand talks up King credentials

Rio Ferdinand has hailed the qualities of Ledley King as the battle to win a place in England's World Cup squad enters its final 72 hours. King made his first appearance for England in three years during Monday's 3-1 win over Mexico at Wembley.The Tottenham defender scored the opening goal although he was far from satisfied with his overall performance.But Ferdinand has no doubts about the quality of King, who looks set to be part of the final 23 despite his ongoing knee problem.The England skipper said: "How did I find partnering Ledley on Monday? Good, very good."But then we all know that Ledley is a quality player so to play alongside him is not a problem."He is a talented footballer and we got on well out there against Mexico."Former captain John Terry is poised to play against Japan in tomorrow's friendly in Graz and, like Ferdinand, is a certainty to be part of the final squad announced on Tuesday.But Ferdinand knows the determination amongst the players to make the most of their final opportunity to impress Capello.And he stressed the need for England to impose themselves on their rivals after being guilty of allowing Mexico time and space during the opening 45 minutes.He said: "Everyone is chomping at the bit to put themselves out there in front of the manager and show him what we can do."We had that chance against Mexico and now there will be another this weekend."There are things to take on board. We didn't press the ball as well as we should all over the park against Mexico in the first half."We are an English team. We need to make sure we press teams and make sure we make it hard for teams to play against us."I thought we didn't do that in the first half as much as we could have."But it was always going to be a good exercise, the chance for players to put themselves in the manager's thinking and there were some good performances for the manager to consider."Ferdinand was left out of the Euro 2000 squad and will have sympathy for the seven players culled from Capello's provisional squad on Tuesday.He said: "I've been there, I've had that talk, that conversation, saying 'you are not experienced enough or not good enough' - however they want to dress it up."You are not getting that chance to go on the plane and to have that said to you is not a nice thing."When the time comes I'm sure we will deal with it in the right way but the manager is top drawer and I'm sure he will sort it out."

Source: Team_Talk