Hodgson: England will be hard to beat

England manager Roy Hodgson believes his side will be hard to beat at next year’s European Championship in France. 

Hodgson’s England were the only side out of 53 nations to qualify for Euro 2016 with a 100 per cent winning record.

England only conceded three goals in ten games and will be seeded among the best teams in Europe which puts them in a good position to progress from the group stages. 

And Hodgson believes he has built a team that will be force to be reckoned with.

“We’re not an easy team to score past and beat, which is good news for the future, and I think we have some very good quality players in our front six, all of whom could win a game for us,” Hodgson said.

“So in terms of the make-up of our team I think we have reasons for optimism, but the Euros are a tough one to win, there are lots of teams out there who look good on paper as well. Which team in the month of June is able to pull it off?

“The beauty is that this good run of form has put us amongst the top seeds, there was only five places, so it was good to get one of those five. So to be in that top pool and avoid five other very strong teams is obviously a very big advantage.

“And I am reasonably confident that we are hard to beat. But of course, in the Euros, even in an expanded Euros like this one, you get a lot of very good teams and you certainly get a lot of teams that are hard to beat.

“Even if you go down to the so-called weakest pool, there are lots of teams in there who are a quite capable of beating the top seeds on their day. Witness Ireland against Germany, and that was in a qualifier not even a friendly.

“This is what we know we have there for us to confront, but it is still nicer to know that the top seeded teams we will avoid at least in the group stage.”

The draw for the group stages takes place in Paris on Saturday.