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England U21 v Poland U21: Pearce to try out his options

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"Mystical" Mike Norman looks ahead to England's U21 friendly against Poland where some big names are missing for England that will allow the likes of Matt Derbyshire and Jamie O'Hara to shine

I like to think that I'm a person who knows quite a lot about football, but when it comes to the Poland under-21's, originally I was a bit like Steve McClaren on a rainy night in November - absolutely clueless!

For example, one of their regular players is a guy called Piotr Polczak (who's he?), who plays for a team called Cracovia Krakow (who are they?), in the Polish Orange Ekstraklasa (what's that?). In fact, the whole Polish squad is littered with players I've never heard of, playing for some very unrecognisable European football clubs.

With players like Bialkowski, Pawlowski and Majewski in the squad, and a manager by the name of Andrzej Zamilski, the Poles can claim to have more Skis than an alpine sports shop - unfortunately though, they don't boast a player by the name of Downhillski - at least we'd know he would have been blessed with pace.

After a bit of research, it's easy to see that the Poland under-21 football team are capable of putting up a bold show against their English counterparts on Tuesday evening, however it would be a huge surprise if a slightly weakened England team don't emerge from this friendly victorious. The match, to be played at Wolverhampton's Molineux Stadium, can be seen live on Sky Sports One (kick-off 7:00pm), and the current odds see England U-21's as the strong [1.27] favourites: Poland U-21's can be backed at [11.5] and the draw at [7.2], though we can expect these odds to increase once the market gets more liquidity into it.

First to Poland, and the first thing to mention is that they appear to struggle to score goals against stronger teams. In their four under-21 qualifying matches against stronger opposition (Spain and Russia) they lost all four without scoring. Reading the match reports however, they point out that Poland were hard to break down in three of those games and only lost narrowly. So although they appear to have an organised defence, their weakness in attack clearly points to an England clean sheet - and this should be available at around [1.7] come kick-off time.

Stuart Pearce has named a weaker squad than usual - how much of that is down to Fabio Capello wanting to name of few of the under-21's in the full squad (only to omit them a few days later) is debatable, but in my opinion it would have been more worthwhile for the likes of Gabriel Agbonlahor, Ashley Young and David Wheater to have another run out at under-21 level, than to be named in the full squad for just 48 hours. Understandably though, Pearce wants to give some International experience to some of England's brightest youngsters - and that can only auger well for the future.

Coventry City duo Scott Dann and Daniel Fox, as well as Manchester United's Fraizer Campbell, have been called up to the squad for the first time, while Ishmael Miller (WBA), Ryan Shawcross (Stoke City) and Tottenham's excellent Jamie O'Hara will be looking for their first cap. Elsewhere is the squad, there is plenty of top flight experience from players such as Man City's Nedum Onuoha and Michael Johnson, Boro's Lee Cattermole and Adam Johnson, Villa's Craig Gardner and Blackburn's Matt Derbyshire.

Although this match is a friendly, and will be treated as such by both teams blooding new talent, England should be far too strong for their opponents. Hopefully an early goal will settle the nerves of the debutants and set us up for an 'England U-21/England U-21' success in the 'Half-Time/Full-Time' market at odds of around [1.73].

England to win by a scoreline of either 2-0 or 3-0 would be my recommendations, and these should be available at around [7.6] and [11.0] respectively once the markets gets more liquidity into it. Despite Poland's initial stubbornness in qualifying matches, it's hard to see why they would 'scrap for their lives' in this slightly meaningless friendly, so despite my correct score predictions, I will have a saver on 'Over 3.5 Goals' just in case this is an open affair with England running riot - I will be hoping for odds of around [3.0] once this market takes shape.