The Under 19 European Championships are currently taking place. They are a good way to gauge future up and coming talent. England were in a group alongside Austria, France and the Netherlands. England finished second behind France to get through to the semi-finals and in the process earn the right to play in the 2011 U-20 World Cup.

England now play Spain in the semi-finals while France is taking on Croatia in the other.

Frank Nouble has scored twice for England while Thomas Cruise and Matt Phillips have been the other goals scorers. Phillips’ goal came deep into injury-time against France. He plays for Wycombe Wanderers although it would hard to see this continuing for too much longer.

The captain of the side is Matthew James who plays for Manchester United. He actually has never played first team football for them and is currently on loan for Preston North End. Jacob Mellis plays for Chelsea but is on loan with Southampton and most of the side seems to be on loan with other sides. Although the truth be told this seems to be the case with most of the other countries as well. At this stage of their careers, very few of the players are actually established.

The only player who seems to be play regular first time Premier League football is Nathan Delfouneso who is a striker with Aston Villa.

There seems to be as many Premier League players playing in the competition for other countries than there are for England.  You have Spain’s
Daniel Pacheco who is at Liverpool; Italy you have Fabio Borini and Jacopo Sale who play for Chelsea and France has Gael Kakuta at Chelsea as well as Francis Coquelin and Gilles Sunu who are at Arsenal. Andreas Weimann of Austria is at Aston Villa.

Based on what happens at the tournament, you may wish to keep an eye on some of these players and then surprise others with your fantasy football prowess.

Such as Spain’s Ezequiel Calvente who scored this audacious penalty.

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