Intro:

Roy Hodgson says he hopes the England players can challenge for the European Championship after being named the new national coach.

Script:

SOUNDBITE: (English) England manager Roy Hodgson:

"I suppose it's a very proud day for me. I'm a very happy man to have been offered the chance to manage my country. I'm looking forward to the task ahead. Everyone knows it's not an easy one but I'm also hoping that everybody, the fans and supporters, everybody within the country will get behind the team because it's the team that counts and it's the team that will win us matches and what I will do is I will do my very best to make sure the team is as well prepared as possible for the tasks that lay ahead. I am grateful for the chance to be the manager of England and I am really looking forward to it."

SOUNDBITE: (English) England manager Roy Hodgson:

It's going to be difficult of course but, hopefully, I have a lot of time on my hands to think about it and make the decisions that are necessary. Obviously, I have been working in the country now for the last five years so all of the players are pretty well known to me, even though I haven't worked with that many of them and it's going to be very important after this press conference to get straight down to the task really of making certain that when the time comes to announce the squad, which we're likely to put back as a matter of fact until after the last game of the season, that I have done as much research as I can and spoken to as many players as I possibly can."

SOUNDBITE: (English) England manager Roy Hodgson:

"Well I certainly think that the players would be disappointed if we expected anything less of them than an attempt to win the tournament and it's very, very important, as i said earlier on, that everybody really gets behind the team and behind the players because at the end it's going to be them that will make us happy at the end of the day if we can produce a winning team."