Harry Kane has leapt to the defence of England's under fire boss Gareth Southgate - but admitted that Tuesday night's chastening 4-0 defeat against Hungary is "unacceptable".
The Three Lions have made a nightmare start to the new UEFA Nations League campaign and are at the bottom of Group A3 after failing to win any of their opening four games. The midweek mauling at the hands of Hungary was their second defeat to Marco Rossi's side in 11 days - but this was a far more damaging result than the 1-0 reverse that they suffered in Budapest earlier this month.
Roland Sallai had fired Hungary into a 16th minute lead and grabbed his second shortly after the break. England imploded shortly after as Zsolt Nagy and Daniel Gazdag netted late goals to condemn the Three Lions to their worst home defeat since 1928.
England are now on the verge of relegation from their Nations League group and Southgate was subjected to loud jeers in the close stages of the match from England fans - who also aimed chants of "You don't know what you're doing" to the former Middlesbrough man.
But Kane quickly threw his weight behind the England chief when he was asked if the squad were still under the right path under Southgate. Kane hit back: “Yeah. Without any question. That’s not even a question I should be answering if I’m honest."
Despite his staunch defence of Southgate, the England skipper made no excuses when discussing the performance and admitted that the Three Lions have simply not been good enough during the international break.
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Kane said: "It’s a disappointing night. First half, I thought we created enough chances to score, but it’s been the story of our Nations League so far. We haven’t quite had the cutting edge.
"But the second half is unacceptable, once we went 2-0 down, to concede in the way we did. But it’s no time to panic, we need to keep our heads up, look forward to a break and come back stronger in September. It’s our first big defeat in a long time."
He added: "We’re preparing for a big World Cup, and will learn a lot from this camp. Let’s not forget where we’ve come from: a first final in 60 years, and a semi-final at a World Cup. Compared to where we were over the last 50 years, it’s no time to panic. It’s not going to be perfect every game, the fans have to understand that.”
