Thursday 8 October 2015 09:07, UK
Joe Hart has warned a perfect qualifying campaign will be irrelevant unless England perform in France next summer.
England play Estonia at Wembley on Friday followed by a trip to Vilnius to face Lithuania on Monday, aiming to complete their Euro 2016 qualifying campaign with 30 points from 10 matches.
However, Hart, who is looking forward to his fourth major tournament with The Three Lions, does not believe winning all their games in Group E is an achievement in itself, and is instead focused on chasing glory in France.
"I think crowning it all would be winning the tournament but these are two games we're going to look to win, like we've looked to win all the games so far," said the Manchester City and England keeper.
"We've accomplished that so these are two more games in which we're going to work on playing in the way we want to play, and then we move on."
When pushed to concede that racking up 10 qualifying wins would be a commendable feat, Hart remained unmoved, adding: "I don't see it being that great an achievement unless we go on and do well in the tournament in the summer."
Upcoming friendlies against Spain, France and Germany will provide a better yardstick with which to measure England's progress since the World Cup.
That failure in Brazil still lingers in the back of the mind, but Hart believes better times lie ahead.
"I definitely feel there is a great deal of belief in the squad," he said. "We feel good as a squad, with the management and the players.
"We've done well. We've picked ourselves up. We were obviously very disappointed a couple of summers ago, but life goes on, football goes on.
"We've reacted in the right way and we're trying to definitely build something. It is a two-year plan and we're halfway through it now and we need to put it right in the summer."
Hart, meanwhile, is predicting a bright future for Tottenham's Dele Alli, who has been called up to the England squad for the first time.
Alli has impressed England manager Roy Hodgson with his performances this season since moving to Spurs from MK Dons and Hart believes the international future is bright for the 19-year-old attacking midfielder.
"He's really pushed on," he added. "He had a good season last season and Tottenham look like they've given him confidence by putting him in their very good side.
"It's good to get him in and he's going to be in and around the England squad for a very long time."
