Frank Lampard talks England, Rooney, Costa, City and more on Sky Sports

Sky Sports 5 welcomed a very special guest to the Sky Sports 5 studio on Thursday night as Chelsea and England legend Frank Lampard joined us for our European Qualifiers coverage.

He spoke to us about a range of topics including England’s comfortable win over San Marino, Roy Hodgson’s current stars, his own England career and his future with Manchester City.

Here’s a snap-shot of that Frank conversation…

Frank on… England’s qualifying campaign

We should win every game – and that’s the target they will be setting for themselves. The biggest target, which the manager has spoken about, is the performance. We need improved performances as individuals because we are going to qualify from this group, there’s no doubt. What we need to do is try to get ourselves in peak condition and at peak performance for the Euros.

Frank on… Wayne Rooney

Knowing Wayne, he will sit there after the game and be slightly frustrated [that he only scored one goal], but I don’t think he should be. He scored his goal from a penalty and he created a couple of chances for himself in the second half that he would have wanted to score on a better day. I was pleased to see him play the whole game and I think the manager was aware he wants to break the record. Wayne loves playing and he carried on for 90 minutes and it was a good captain’s performance. It was a great penalty. If you see the size of his feet they are like blocks. He does it all the time in training when he side-foots strikes and gets such pace on them. Goalkeepers don’t expect that.

Frank on… Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain

I think The Ox’s career, at times, has been broken up by injury. Going into the World Cup he was looking very sharp and would have been prominent and played a lot of games, but he got injured. At Arsenal, he tends to get injured at times but when he gets on runs of form and plays like he did against San Marino he has got the pace and the ability on the ball. When you see someone like him coming into a game, he’ll have a few shots and arrive in the box and it all changes and goes up a notch. I quite like him centrally because he can get more on the ball centrally. In those areas he is really dangerous because he is running at centre-halves and back fours from a central position. He is going to have to work on his game defensively then because against good teams he is going to have to make sure he does the other work. He has got the fitness levels and will learn that game. I like him there. Arsene Wenger has flirted with putting him there and that could be a long-term role for him.

Frank on…Andros Townsend

He gave us pace and at the top level of football you need people with pace, who can make things happen out of nothing. He came in and did that last season he has had a bit of a lull for whatever reason – injuries didn’t help in the summer – but England and Spurs will need him to get back to that sort of form. The goal was significant for him. It’s easy sometimes for forward players to come on in a game like this and just want to score goals and do the easy things at the other end. He did do that, but his goal came from him winning a tackle on the half-way line. He helped England to qualify last year and for me he is at his best when he slips inside. He gets great pace and dip on his shot and that will give him confidence. It mi