The England Under-21s manager, Stuart Pearce, has said it will be a disappointment if his team does not win this summer’s European Championship.

Pearce yesterday selected two Saints players, defenders Nathaniel Clyne and Luke Shaw, in his 23-man squad for the tournament in Israel.

England enter as one of the heavy favourites, having strung together a record nine-match winning streak, in which they have not conceded a goal.

They will face Italy, Norway and the host nation in the group stages.

“We set out two years ago to win the tournament,” said Pearce.

“It is a four-step process; you have to get out of your group in qualification, you have to win the play-off, you have to get out of the group in the finals and then win the tournament.

“We’ve done two of those, and now we have got a scenario where I think anything less than winning it, I will be disappointed. It always will be.

“We’ve had three tournaments in the past that we’ve all learned things from. It is good, I think, to look back two years hence and at where the development of certain players have gone.

“Roll the clock back two years and if somebody had said to me Ryan Bertrand would be a Champions League winner, Phil Jones and Chris Smalling would have gone straight into the full England squad, Kyle Walker would be in it and various other players that have gone onto achieve things, I would have thought ‘yeah, okay that’s good’.

“Danny Welbeck and Daniel Sturridge were in the group two years ago and you hope that in two years’ time after this tournament, we are going to have the same number of players that go onto the seniors, having developed a fantastic understanding of tournament football.”