Gerrard: We can beat the Swedes (From Swindon Advertiser)

Gerrard: We can beat the Swedes

7:40pm Thursday 14th June 2012 in National Sport © Press Association 2013

Skipper Steven Gerrard is confident England will finally gain their first win over Sweden in a competitive match if they emulate the performance they gave in their Euro 2012 opener against France.

England have failed to overcome the Swedes in seven previous World Cup or European Championship encounters ahead of Tuesday's Group D clash in Kiev, but Gerrard is adamant that sequence should end, even allowing for the threat posed by Swedish striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic.

Gerrard said: "I would think the same level of performance against France will be good enough to beat Sweden."

He went on: "I would say so with all due respect to Sweden who are a good, strong team, but they are not France.

"I think we can be a little bit more bold and a little bit more ambitious and get at the Swedes a little bit more.

"We are confident if we reach the same level of performance, it will be enough for a victory."

However, Gerrard warned: "Although we are confident, that's not to say we won't be trying to learn from the mistakes we made in the first game.

"We've analysed what we did right and wrong against France and we will be trying to improve on our performance as well.

"I'm really happy with the start we've made to the tournament. It was really solid and we've left ourselves a good platform to build on.

"The boys are confident we will be on four points after this next game and that will be a good start to this group."