Milner is confident as focus turns to World Cup

Several players tasted senior tournament football for the first time in Ukraine and Poland before England went out 4-2 on penalties to Italy in their quarter-final in Kiev on Sunday.

Milner can see plenty of plus points as England recovered from the loss of key players through injury ahead of the tournament and head coach Roy Hodgson having little time to prepare.

The Manchester City midfielder said: “It is hard to put into words, the disappointment. We had a great group stage and to get knocked out on penalties again is pretty hard to take.

“But then you look at the circumstances going into the tournament, the manager changing, the number of injuries and the number of people dropping out.

“The whole 23 have to contribute to have a good tournament and everyone has worked hard on the training ground.

“The manager has put his ideas together and the longer we work with the manager, I’m sure we will keep getting better and better.

“You look at the squad, it’s a lot younger squad now. It was the first major tournament for a lot of the lads at senior level.

“It’s all experience and it can only stand you in good stead if we qualify for the next World Cup.”

When asked what England can improve upon, Milner, who rose through the ranks at Leeds United, said: “We were very solid, I thought we defended well, and we are still undefeated under the new manager not counting penalties.

“That is obviously a positive. Maybe we can keep the ball a bit better when going forward.

“But the more we are together, the more we work with the manager, the confidence will come and the improvement will be there.”

Milner passed on a good luck message to City team-mate Mario Balotelli, who scored Italy’s opening penalty in the shoot-out after the 120 minutes of normal and extra time finished goalless.

He said: “Mario is a danger, had one or two shots, is a good player, but we knew he wasn’t going to be the only danger.

“He’s a good penalty taker as well and was always going to be confident.

“We sat together in the doping test room after the game and he’s a good guy. I wished him all the best for the next game.”

Milner’s international team-mate Wayne Rooney also says England can “hold their heads high” despite suffering more penalty shoot-out heartbreak.

Hodgson’s side suffered the same fate as the England teams of 1990, 1996, 1998, 2004 and 2006 in exiting major tournaments on penalties.

After a goalless 120 minutes, Ashley Young hit the crossbar and Ashley Cole’s shot was saved by Gianluigi Buffon.

Rooney said: “It was a horrible way to go out. We are all gutted. It was a tough game and we all worked hard. To lose on penalties is such a horrible feeling for everyone. But we can hold our heads up high. There are a lot of young players in the squad and that experience will help them in the next tournament.”

Hodgson admitted Rooney failed to live up to expectations after returning from a two-match ban for his sending-off against Montenegro in a qualifying game last October.

After scoring the winner against Ukraine, Rooney was below par in the quarter-final defeat by Italy and Hodgson said: “I think we put a lot of expectations on Wayne.

“When he missed the first two games, we were all believing that what we needed to do was to get to the third game and Wayne Rooney will win us the championships. That maybe was too much to ask of him. Wayne certainly tried very hard, but he didn’t have his best game. I think he would admit that.”

But Hodgson conceded it was natural for the onus to be on the top players to perform on the biggest stages.

He said: “Do we put too much expectation on Rooney? Well we do, but so do other teams with their players, don’t they?

“I think had (Andrea) Pirlo played poorly, it might have affected the Italians’ performance.

“I think in all top international teams, you’re looking at one, two, possibly three individuals that everyone recognises as being exceptional world-class talents.

“When you get to the big stage, you’re hoping those players perform and show they’re world-class talents.”