Gareth Southgate suggested his England players are struggling to deal with the pressure of being among the favourites for Euro 2024 following the abject 1-1 draw with Denmark, but says the responsibility rests with him.
England were second best but escaped with a point in Frankfurt, as Morten Hjulmand's fine strike cancelled out Harry Kane's opening goal.
The result leaves England effectively in the last-16 after two unconvincing performances in Germany, but concerns are mounting for the manager, who believes his young squad are not coping with levels of expectation.
“We know the level has to be higher, we know the level can be higher," Southgate said. "Maybe the biggest thing is we have to accept the environment that we're in and the expectations that are around us. We are going to have to walk towards that challenge.
“At the moment we're falling a little bit short of that. Ultimately that's my responsibility. I'm the manager and I've got to guide this group in the best way possible. To achieve extraordinary things, you have to go through some difficult moments.
"Today was a difficult moment without a doubt, towards the end of the game, especially.
“But England have never won back-to-back qualification matches [at the Euros] I was told yesterday, so there's a reason for that and we hoped to write a different story today. We haven't managed that.
“We understand what that will mean for the next few days, but we have to stay calm inside the group and find good solutions to improve it.”
Southgate continued: “The challenge is to do something that’s never been done before [by winning the Euros], so it couldn't be any bigger.
“We know that we've had a lot of issues to deal with in the lead into that, but we are where we are now, and we have to find the best way forward, so that's the responsibility I have.
“I've got to lead the group in the right way, make intelligent decisions to find the best balance, to find more of a threat with what we're delivering with the ball and to be better without the ball so that we're not needing to defend for the long periods of the game that we are at the moment.”
There were some boos from England's supporters in the Frankfurt Arena towards the end of the match, and Southgate says his players have to accept criticism.
"We have to accept this is the environment we’re in," Southgate said. "The environment of winning on the biggest possible stage.
“If we don't hit the level, if I don’t hit the level that's needed, then we have to accept what comes our way. We have to find the best way to solve that.
"Of course we need the fans, you know we need the fans, but I have to say they've been brilliant, absolutely brilliant in the stadiums.
“And I can completely understand their frustration with the way that we played, but what I would say is these boys aren’t lacking effort at the moment. It's not a case that they're not trying but we've got to find a better way of playing, we've got to find more quality in what we're doing.
“I don't think people would look at them and say ‘they don't care’.
“If anything at the moment we care too much and we've got to find a way of getting that right balance.”
Southghate replaced his entire front three with 20 minutes remaining, captain Harry Kane, Phil Foden and Bukayo Saka making way for Ollie Watkins, Eberechi Eze and Jarrod Bowen.
Watkins forced a save from Kasper Schmeichel but the changes were largely ineffectively, as Denmark finished the stronger.
"We just felt more frontline put a lot of work into the game the other day," said Southgate, when asked if Kane was fully fit.
“He's only had one 90 minutes in the last five or six weeks, so the other night took a lot out of him.
“We could have stayed with it, but we thought to get speed in the frontline at that moment, to get energy to be able to press was important. So, that was the decision we took with all of the substitutes basically.”
