England national under-21 football team
national under-21 association football team representing England
The England national under-21 football team, also known as England under-21s or England U21(s), is the national under-21 association football team of England, under the control of the Football Association. It is considered to be the feeder team for the England national football team.
This team is for England players aged under 21 at the start of the calendar year in which a two-year UEFA European Under-21 Championship campaign begins, so some players can remain with the squad until the age of 23. As long as they are eligible, players can play for England at any level, making it possible to play for the U21s, senior side, and again for the U21s, as Jack Butland, Harry Kane, Calum Chambers, John Stones and Emile Smith Rowe have done. It is also possible to play for one country at youth level and another at senior level (providing the player has not played a senior competitive game for his previous country).
The U21 team came into existence in 1976, following the realignment of UEFA's youth competitions. A goalless draw in a friendly against Wales at Molineux Stadium was England U21s' first result.
England U21s do not have a permanent home. They play in stadia across England, in an attempt to encourage younger fans in all areas of the country to attend matches. Because of the lower demand compared to the senior national team, smaller grounds can be used.
“England national under-21 football team” enters the record as national under-21 association football team representing England. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what England, national and under-21 can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 27, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q204238. None of the 2 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1976.
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This entry incorporates text from “England national under-21 football team” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.