Sven-Goran Eriksson is placing his trust in David Beckham to lead England's Euro 2004 fightback - by putting his penalty miss against France firmly behind him.

Eriksson held a squad meeting yesterday and mentioned England's morale-sapping 2-1 defeat by the French only briefly before turning his concentration to Thursday's second group game against Switzerland.

For the England coach knows that his players cannot afford to feel sorry themselves, despite fate seemingly having turned against them with Zinedine Zidane's two injury-time goals.

Beckham admitted his share of the blame for England's 2-1 defeat in their opening group game, with Fabien Barthez having saved his penalty at 1-0 up.

However, Eriksson has no intention of removing the midfielder from the penalty firing-line, even though he ballooned his previous spot-kick effort over the bar in Istanbul.

The England coach, who has a fresh fitness worry over Paul Scholes, declared: ''If David feels that he doesn't want to do it any more, then we will pick someone else.

''But if he feels that he is still the best, then he will carry on. I think he should like to take another penalty today if there was another chance.

''I don't have any worries about him.''

Indeed, Eriksson has called upon his captain to use his experience to ensure the entire squad, and especially the younger players, do not allow self-doubt to creep into their minds now.

''David was alone in the dressing-room after the game when everyone was already sitting on the bus,'' revealed Eriksson.

''I said something about the fact that he's important now, like all the coaches, to start building things up again morally and mentally.

''He is mentally strong and he is our captain so, of course, he can give a lead to the rest of the squad.

''It's important that all the senior players, like Gary Neville, Sol Campbell and Michael Owen, do that.''

Eriksson spent just two minutes discussing the defeat by France in yesterday's team talk, preferring to stress the positives to his squad.

Namely, the fact that they led the favourites until injury-time and were on the verge of an accomplished victory.

''Tactically and fitness-wise, I have nothing to say to them apart from congratulations on their performance,'' he insisted.

''What do you say to Steven Gerrard? 'Don't play the ball to the goalkeeper?' He didn't see Thierry Henry, so what do you say about that? It's only human.

''What do you say to David Beckham? 'Put the penalty in the other corner?'

''We did a fantastic game if you take away the last three minutes of injury-time.

"The players did exactly what we had asked them to do. If I should do it again, I would do it in the same way.

''In the dressing-room, the players were not singing or talking. Of course, it wasn't a party. But knowing the English mentality, I think the players will be looking forward to Thursday.''

Eriksson can remember just two other games which ended so dramatically.

One was the 1999 Champions League final when Manchester United clinched the Treble. The other, which required a golden goal winner in extra-time, was the Euro 2000 final, when France came back to beat Italy.

The key difference, however, is that this time it was not a knock-out game, leaving England with little room for further error but still time to recover.

''I'll tell the players that this wasn't the final, life goes on and we must carry on performing like that and then it's very difficult to beat us,'' declared Eriksson.

''Everyone who saw the game will have a lot of respect for England, even if we lost. If we perform like that again, I think we will go through and do a very good tournament.''

Frank Lampard, meanwhile, has insisted England's belief they can beat France when it really matters has not been knocked - even though the next time they could meet in Euro 2004 would be in the final.

Lampard said: ''We will use the experience of Sunday to a) get us through to the next stage and b) to go all the way in the competition.

''If we meet France again in this competition, we have to be confident. We were confident before Sunday.

"We showed them how we can play.

"We showed a lot of people how we can play.

''Of course it will be hard initially to pick ourselves up and I should imagine that not many people would have slept very well on Sunday night.

''It is hurting because a win would have given us great confidence and would have put us well on the way to the next stage.

"We have to dig deep and show a lot of character. We have to be strong and come back from it."