The summer signing continues to turn heads for club and country, with the coach impressed with his cutting edge in the win over Iceland and praising his all-round performance
Arsenal youngster Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain has been hailed by England under-21 boss Stuart Pearce as a big prospect for the future following another memorable performance on international duty.
The 18-year-old scored three goals against Iceland on Thursday night to cap off a win that took the Three Lions to the top of their Euro 2013 qualifying group, a performance that came a month after he set up a hosts of goals after coming on as a substitute in a friendly against Israel.
And Pearce was quick to praise the former Southampton man's display and his growth as a player in the past few months.
"Alex Chamberlain was outstanding," he told FATV.
"He’s a real talent and gave us that cutting edge. He’s a team-member as well, his general all-round performance was very, very good.
"He’s a talented boy who has come on in leaps and bounds since we had him with us at the back end of last season, which is very pleasing.
"Alex is very level-headed, but you have to say that anyone scoring a hat-trick on international duty has done very well and it’s very pleasing for any manager."
Oxlade-Chamberlain, who moved to Arsenal from Southampton in the summer, said that although he was thrilled to score, the most important thing was the result and the performance of the team.
“To get a hat-trick and my first international goals tonight, I’m happy with that," he said.
“But the most important thing was for the lads to win and to get more points to help us qualify.
“We knew if we respected the opposition, matched them and worked harder than them then eventually the ability and the quality the team has would shine through and we would win the game.
“We did realise that they were quite a dangerous team, especially on the counter and when they went forward they got a lot of bodies forward. But that was also their weakness so we could counter them. For my first goal I think we showed that."
He added: “It’s important in any game of football to get off to a good start, it stands the team in good stead.
“We did drop off a bit after that and the manager said at half-time that we need to respond and come out on fire. I think we did that, got another goal and pushed on.
“We’ve all got the same idea, we want to qualify and we’re going to do that by winning each game, keeping clean sheets and putting the ball in the back of the net.
“We’ve only conceded one goal in the three games this season, so it’s not just the boys up front who are doing a good job, but the boys at the back and in midfield.
"It’s definitely a team performance and even the ones who didn’t play tonight and are in the squad, everyone is pulling together. The quality of the training has made a healthy competition for places.
“We know it’s going to be another hard game for us and we’re going to approach it in the same way. But we’re confident in the ability of the squad to get the win.”
Pearce was happy with the way his side handled a tricky Iceland side, even if they got a bit complacent at times.
"Three goals away from home here in Iceland, and a clean sheet, so I’m very pleased with the result and a couple of performances within that. We did pick up a couple of injuries but we’ll address that," Pearce said.
"One thing that underpins us is a team ethic, and I think we showed that. I thought we got a little complacent during a 20-minute spell before half-time where we lost our way a little bit, we didn’t want to do the dirty stuff because we’d got a couple of goals.
"But we spoke about that at half-time and they came out and played more like they should have done. We just told them to maximise their potential rather than play within themselves."
source
0 comments:
Post a Comment