I’M delighted with the way England are performing at Euro 2012.

The reason being that for the first time in a long time we are playing like a real team at a major tournament.

I don’t agree with the pundits who are being quite negative about our performances and prospects.

Firstly, it’s great to see every single member of the team singing the National Anthem, including manager Roy Hodgson and coach Ray Lewington, and I think it’s a conscious thing to announce ‘we are united’.

To see players congratulating each other and giving high fives at the end of matches also suggests they believe they are a unit.

Chelsea won the Champions League like that. They weren’t the best team, but if you are David against Goliath you have to come up with a tactic for winning when, on pure ability, you are not as good as the opposition.

I think Hodgson has got the midfield looking really tight, and Steve Gerrard had probably his best game for two years against Ukraine.

All the cynics are saying Ukraine and Sweden, who are not the best right now, dominated possession against us.

But we simply don’t have the ability or style of play to be able to dominate possession like that – we are not that type of country.

Yes, it’s lovely on the eye and all the rest of it when teams are passing the ball around, but it’s not what we are and I think Hodgson has done really well in such a short space of time to get the team really building and working for each other.

They are the most together England team I can remember at a major tournament for many years – and after the shambles of South Africa in the World Cup I think that has to be applauded massively.

So to the quarter-final with Italy on Sunday night.

We have beaten Italy only once in nine meetings and we don’t have a great record in quarter-finals at major tournaments, losing seven of the last 10.

Italy, in contrast, have lost only two of their last 10 major quarter-finals – and both of those on penalties – so the stats men will be heavily backing Italy.

Italy’s X Factor is Mario Balotelli and what he produces, but the great thing for us is that there is no fear factor involved.

Joleon Lescott will enjoy playing against his teammate from Manchester City and Joe Hart will too – I am sure they will be winding him up!

Andrea Pirlo is a fantastic player, too, and every time I see Italy, so much depends on him. If Pirlo is on his game, then Italy are on their game and vice versa.

That being the case, we might even see Wayne Rooney doing a job on Pirlo, ‘sitting’ on him as much as possible and particularly when we don’t have possession.

If Milner and Young (if fit) can do the defensive job they have been so far, then we’ve always got Theo Walcott to come on and make the sort of impact he did against Sweden.

So, in summary, I’ve been impressed with England.

How much further we can go remains to be seen, but it’s just great to see us being really competitive and putting in performances again at a major tournament.