England failed to make it eight consecutive victories after only managing a 1-1 draw against Italy in a friendly match, but manager Roy Hodgson was very pleased man after this match.

After coming under heavy criticism following a disappointing World Cup, the former Liverpool boss has managed to oversee spectacular run of form. England had won all their matches – since the World Cup – leading up to this friendly. Andros Townsend provided the equaliser on the night and England appeared to be disappointed by the draw. Still, it is eight matches unbeaten for the national team.

Hodgson admitted after the match that there was still work to be done within the team, but he is extremely pleased with the progress made by the young players in the last six months. Out have gone a number of experienced professionals like Steven Gerrard, Frank Lampard and Ashley Cole in the last 12 months. Hodgson has replaced them with young players like Ross Barkley and Harry Kane, who appear to be the future of English football at international level. There were plenty of positives from the Euro 2016 qualifying match against Lithuania, which the team won 4-0. As result of scoring in this match, Welbeck became the top scorer in the qualification phase so far.

“We are trying to consistently hone what we have been doing and we are getting such a good response that I do feel there is some progression. But as you saw in Italy, we still can’t turn it on as I would like, otherwise we wouldn’t have had a first half like we did, which I was not at all satisfied with. Happily we got back on track, got our minds attuned and played the football we wanted to play in the second half,” said the England manager after the match.