JEFF WHITLEY has become a man used to dishing out lessons in the Championship with Sunderland this season, but he felt the full force of an England avalanche of international class at Old Trafford.

Whitley, along with Damien Johnson in the middle of the Northern Ireland midfield, had their work cut out against Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard on Saturday and it has left the Black Cats star fulsome in his praise for those wearing white.

The 29-year-old earned his 16th international cap in Manchester and, after being on the wrong end of a 4-0 hammering, he has backed Sven-Goran Eriksson to lead England to glory at next year's World Cup in Germany.

After initially keeping Wayne Rooney et al at bay until half-time, albeit through expert goalkeeping and the woodwork, there was just no stopping the home country after the break when Joe Cole set the ball rolling with a clinical strike.

Four goals inside the first 17 minutes of the second period ensured that England retained their place at the top of Group Six with a comfortable 4-0 win.

But Whitley, well aware Northern Ireland sit 111th in the world rankings, insisted even the best countries across the globe would have struggled to cope with such an attacking surge.

And now the Sunderland tough-tackler believes there is every chance that England could be celebrating success for the first time in 40 years - when the World Cup comes to Germany in 2006.

"England have got cracking individual players and we saw on Saturday just what they are capable of," said Whitley. "They don't play fantastic week in and week out but when they gel they are a great team.

"They can win things, of course they can. They have got great players that play all over the world, that shows how good a team they are. They can go a long way in next year's World Cup.

"They have plenty of star players but I thought Wayne Rooney was a pest all afternoon to us. He got into some great positions just behind our midfield. No one knows how to cope with him because he pops up everywhere.

"But there are others as well and Joe Cole was fantastic. Joe has been on fire for ages at Chelsea and he was on top of his game again against us. He will be hoping to get a long run in the team now."

While England eyes turn to next summer, Northern Ireland know their chances of reaching the finals for the first time since Mexico 1986 remain slim.

Lawrie Sanchez flew his squad out to Poland yesterday knowing that failure to pick up three points in Warsaw on Wednesday night will mean failure once again.

Despite Saturday's crushing blow against England, and Poland's 8-0 win over Azerbaijan, Whitley is remaining optimistic and insists there is still a determination in the Irish camp to end on a high.

There are five games remaining and Sanchez's side sit fourth in the table ahead of Wales and Azerbaijan. And Whitley said: "We have to go away with the positives. We have to go to Poland and win to give ourselves any chance of qualifying. We know that.

"We can look forward to England and a few others coming to Windsor Park and maybe we can turn them all over, who knows."

But the former Manchester City midfielder admits that mistakes made against England cannot be repeated if improvements are going to continue under the Sanchez reign.

After the goalless first half, Plymouth's Tony Capaldi gifted the ball to Joe Cole just seconds after the restart on Saturday and the Chelsea man capitalised by stroking the ball past Maik Taylor.

And, up until that point, Whitley claims there was a feeling that a point at least could be stolen from Old Trafford.

"The boys worked hard in the first half but we knew it was going to be hard in the second half. Conceding that early goal was a huge blow. The lads were buzzing at half-time and were confident but a lack of concentration killed us straight away," said Whitley, whose next Sunderland game is at QPR this Saturday.

"When that went in it wasn't dead but then England scored just six minutes after that and from there England just grew, grew and grew. We couldn't get near them.

"We didn't just go there to make the numbers up against England, we genuinely believed we could get something. It just wasn't to be."