Gerrard: England deserve to be booed

Steven Gerrard believes England deserve to be jeered by supporters during Wednesday's friendly against Hungary - and the Three Lions captain admitted he would join in if he was in the stands at Wembley.

Gerrard ready for booing

• Foster withdraws from squad
• Finals flops facing night on the boos
• Capello targets Euro glory
• Pearce: England players find pride
• Forum: Do you care about England?
• Play Premier League fantasy

England are expected to be given a tough time by fans following their disappointing World Cup campaign and boss Fabio Capelloearlier revealed that he will throw his underperforming players to the lions - starting the players who flattered to deceive in South Africa to take the brunt of supporters' frustrations.

Gerrad will certainly be one of those players, but he revealed he can empathise with the fans and appears to have accepted the inevitable fate that awaits him and his team-mates at Wembley.

"I'm expecting a mixed reaction," Gerrard said. "I'm sure there'll be boos but we have to take it on the chin. We deserve it, we let them down.

"Hopefully, with time, we can show them we are a good team and that we're desperate to make them happy.''

Asked if he would boo the national team, he said: "I probably would.''

Capello received a lot of criticism for his man-management and tactics during the World Cup but the Football Association chose to stick with the Italian, and Gerrard has no doubt it was the right decision.

"I've got big faith in this manager," Gerrard said. "It would be very stupid and naive not to have that moving forward. He's a fantastic manager.

"You can't shift all the blame onto the manager in these situations. We have to share the blame and take it on the chin together.

"All the players will listen very carefully over the next couple of days and looking forward. Obviously things didn't work out in South Africa so we have to listen to the man who has the experience and follow his lead.

"The manager spoke on behalf of all of us yesterday. For me there are no excuses at all. The simple message is we have to show how sorry we are by our performances on the pitch.

"We have to study where we went wrong on the pitch against Germany and try to put those things right. The mental side of things will only improve by winning games.''

Liverpool defender Jamie Carragher, Gerrard's team-mate for club and country, shared his view on Capello, refusing to blame the England coach for the failings in South Africa.

"I would never criticise Fabio because he has done too much in the game and if he stopped being a manager tomorrow he would go down in history as one of the great managers," Carragher said.

"I always find it hard when players criticise managers because we've never been managers ourselves. We all realise what comes with playing for England - it's massive - and when something goes wrong everyone jumps on it.

"Obviously the World Cup didn't go well but the players have to look at themselves and say we didn't perform as we can."