Hodgson hopeful for England's future

England boss Roy Hodgson is confident the side have a bright future with their new crop of young players. 

With his team eliminated from the World Cup, Hodgson made nine changes to the starting XI for the final game against Costa Rica, which England drew 0-0.

That gave them their only point of the campaign in Brazil, as they finished bottom of Group D.

"I take positives - this was a banana skin. To get that display was great since for many it was new," he said.

"I am pleased at least to have given the fans something to cheer about in terms of our performance."

Six players aged 24 and under started against Costa Rica, whose surprise wins over Uruguay and Italy saw them top the group.

The England coach added: "We had nine players without any World Cup experience. There was only James Milner and Lampard [with experience], until Wayne Rooney and Gerrard came on.

"The back four were completely new to this and our keeper [Ben Foster] hadn't played for a long time. We limited Costa Rica to almost no chances."

England's best opportunities of the match fell to Liverpool striker Sturridge, who headed over from close range and then curled fractionally wide of the far post.

"We created good goal chances, but we didn't take them," said Hodgson. "Another day we could have won the game by one or two goals because we did have a clear dominance in the play after the first 15 to 20 minutes." 

Lampard, who won his 106th cap, also thought England should have taken all three points.
"It was the end of a disappointing tournament, obviously," he said.

"We should have won the game as we had the chances. We played some nice stuff, in bits.

"It was a difficult game for us to approach and I thought we did as well as we could but it was a shame not to get the win to take home."