England Under-21s midfielder Will Hughes has claimed that his side's superior quality eventually shone through during their playoff victory over Croatia Under-21s this afternoon.
The Young Lions reached the 2015 Euros courtesy of a 4-2 aggregate victory, winning the second leg 2-1 in Vinkovci this evening following victory by the same scoreline at Molineux on Friday.
Hughes scored his side's second of the match and believes that the performance from Gareth Southgate's team proved that English teams can play to a high standard.
"We showed our quality and how we can play. A lot of people have a perception that England can't play football but I think we've come here and shown that we can, especially in the second half," the Derby County midfielder told TheFA.com.
"Luckily we got the first goal, which controlled it a bit for us. But unfortunately they hit back and we knew it was going to be a nervy second half. But once we got that second goal, they had to score three and we controlled it from then on.
"It feels brilliant [to have scored], but it was a great team effort. We really dug in and knew it would be hard coming out here when there was only one goal in it. We got told at half time that we needed to press higher up and keep hold - and it showed quite a lot of balls from the team to do that when it was so close. But we showed our quality in the end."
Meanwhile, there was a shock elsewhere as holders Spain U21s were beaten by Serbia to miss out on a place in Czech Republic next year.
Barney Corkhill
Spain U21s
