England Under-21 boss Stuart Pearce has hailed the performance of his side following their 4-0 win over Sweden.

Blackpool winger Thomas Ince notched his first two goals for the Under-21 side while Sunderland's Connor Wickham and Liverpool's Jonjo Shelvey also hit the target in a comfortable friendly win.

Pearce told ESPN: "We scored four goals, kept a clean sheet, it's difficult to pick a negative out of it. It's fantastic to kick the new year off with a good result and it's something to build on for the summer.

"I think its arguably as well as we've played, certainly for 45 minutes.

"We've had better results against stronger teams maybe over the years, but certainly the way we grabbed the game by the scruff of the neck, it could have been certainly more than that, [I'm] absolutely delighted."

England kick off their Under-21 European Championship campaign on the June 5 in Tel Aviv against Italy.