Harry Winks believes there’s no reason to read too much into England Under-21s’ defeat to Germany on Friday.
The Tottenham Hotspur midfielder picked up his second cap for the U21s in the 1-0 defeat in Wiesbaden, where a first-half goal from Nadiem Amiri was enough to separate the teams.
And whilst the Young Lions never really got into full flow against an experienced German side, with both nations having one eye on preparing for this summer’s Euro Finals, Winks was honest in his assessment.
“It was one of those games which didn’t really go our way, from start to finish,” he admitted.
“We thought we did well later on in the game, but the early goal killed us a little bit and knocked the wind out of us.
“We fought very well and kept on going but on the day Germany were better than us in terms of the way they played and they won.
“On the day, we just weren’t good enough to win the game.”
Germany will be among the nations joining Aidy Boothroyd’s squad at the Euros in Poland this June, so the match represented a good warm-up for both teams.
After ten wins from ten in their qualifying campaign and a squad with plenty of experience in the German Bundesliga, Winks believes they will be a strong contender in the summer.
But he also revealed there is no shortage of big-game experience and know-how within the England squad who also impressed during qualifying and he didn't notice too much of a domestic difference between the teams whilst on the pitch.
“We’ve got a lot of confidence in our team, a lot of the boys have played in big matches themselves,” he explained.
“The German players have a lot of experience, but so do we and we played well in parts of the game.
“Of course, it’s difficult to compare the Bundesliga to the Premier League, but the quality and ability in the squad is second to none and we just didn’t show that.
“But all the players here have played games within English football, some have played abroad and we have a lot of Premier League appearances between us.”
The 21-year-old is one player who has made a top-flight breakthrough back home this season, becoming a firm favourite with Spurs boss Mauricio Pochettino.
That resulted in his first call-up to the U21s last November and his subsequent debut against France.
And having seen the likes of his club mates such as Dele Alli, Harry Kane and Eric Dier make the step from the U21s to the senior team, Winks believes there is a pathway available should he impress enough.
“The manager [Boothroyd] has told us that there are opportunities there, as long as we keep performing for club and country and doing well, then the opportunity is there to take,” explained Winks, who is also still young enough to feature for the U21s in the next Euro campaign.
“With someone like Gareth in charge, he likes young players and he’s keen to bring us through and give us opportunities.
“You could see that the other night [senior game v Germany], we had a lot of young players playing and it’s just down to us really, whether we perform at club level to get the call-up.
“My next step is to take it game-by-game, whether that’s for the U21s here or for Tottenham back at home.
“I’m quite young and all I can do is perform when I’m given the opportunities, I can’t read the future and I can’t say I should be here or I should be there.
“I just want to perform at a level that I’m capable of and hopefully I can take it on to the next step.”
The U21s squad now head north from Germany to face Denmark in Randers on Monday evening. That game kicks-off at 6pm GMT and will be live on BT Sport.
