Eric Dier: 'Progress under Gareth Southgate is clear to see'

Versatile England midfielder Eric Dier has insisted that "the progress is clear to see" since Gareth Southgate took charge of the national side.

The Three Lions conceded a controversial late penalty against Italy on Tuesday night to draw 1-1, extending their unbeaten run to eight matches following the 1-0 win over the Netherlands last Friday.

Southgate has used the spring friendlies to experiment with different options, and Tottenham Hotspur ace Dier believes that the former Under-21s boss deserves credit for his work over the past 18 months.

"I don't really care how experienced you are, how old or young, whether it's your debut or first tournament. The most important thing is to just be yourself and to have a positive attitude," the London Evening Standard quotes him as saying. "We have that as a team and so does the manager.

"We have to be ourselves, not worry about things like that and just try to be the best that we can be. The circumstances when Gareth took over must have been very difficult. He came completely out of the blue. But the way he has handled himself and the players has been brilliant from the start.

"After the first few camps it was still a bit new to everyone, but now we are used to the roles and everything has become more natural when we get together. That's really helping now.

"We would have liked to have won both of our friendlies during this international break, but the progress is clear to see. We can feel that as well. We have to keep working hard to maintain our progress going because there is still a lot we can improve on."

Southgate is due to name his provisional 35-man squad before England's next match in early June.