Eddie Nketiah: Blame the players for England U21s poor performances, not Aidy Boothroyd

Portugal v England - 2021 UEFA European Under-21 Championship
The FA via Getty Images

England Under-21 captain Eddie Nketiah has backed under-fire manager Aidy Boothroyd and says the players must take the blame for the Young Lions' disastrous European Championship performance.

Nketiah and his England teammates are on the brink of an embarrassing exit at the group stage with their fate in the hands of others ahead of the final game against Croatia on Wednesday.

Defeats to Switzerland and Portugal - during which England managed just one shot on target, from a free-kick - leave Boothroyd's side bottom of the group and needing a minor miracle to save them.

Having been in a very similar position with an even more talented group two years ago, and with his contract up this summer, Boothroyd is in the firing line after two desperately underwhelming displays.

However, Nketiah - who last week thanked Boothroyd for his weekly calls of support during a difficult time out of the side at Arsenal this year - says the players are the ones who should bear the brunt of the blame.

“We’re very disappointed," said Nketiah. "Aidy’s obviously done brilliantly for all of us and obviously when we're winning and doing well in the qualifying there’s not as much on him.

"I think the players have to look at ourselves first before we blame anyone else. We all know how good we are and the quality we have and we haven't really lived up to that yet. We haven’t started as well as we can and we haven’t played to the best of our abilities, individually and collectively. We all have to look at ourselves. None of the players here want to point or blame.

"We always look at ourselves first and Aidy and the staff have done everything to try and help us to push through and they will continue to do that. We always support our staff and they support us so it's just about channelling our focus to what is still obviously possible in qualifying and giving our all against Croatia and fighting for the badge.”

The FA via Getty Images

Nketiah top scored in qualifying for this tournament, becoming the all-time leading scorer for England at U21 level in the process and was handed the armband by Boothroyd for the games in Slovenia.

While his form for England had been fantastic building up to the tournament, the Arsenal man has barely had a sniff when it has come to chances during the two group stage games.

"We all had sloppy moments in the game and it's just about cutting that out and playing to the best of our ability," said Nketiah of the lack of creativity.

"We know we have the quality and we have shown in qualifying that we can score balls, so it's about producing that here and taking that bit of extra care and detail with the final pass."

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