David Beckham has spelt out his determination to start experiencing the same kind of success with England that has become second nature to him with Manchester United.

Beckham goes into tomorrow's opening World Cup qualifier with Germany at Wembley admitting that England have greatly underachieved - a stark contrast to his trophy-laced times at Old Trafford.

He was as bemused as anyone in the squad at England's dismal performance in Euro 2000 when gaining the first win over the Germans in 34 years represented the only consolation.

Beckham has already given coach Kevin Keegan a massive boost by declaring that he is 95 per cent certain to play in the last ever match at the Twin Towers after concerns over a knee injury.

Now the player, who made his England debut in the first match of the last World Cup campaign against Moldova in 1996, is looking to set his country on the march to glory.

Beckham, who is set to revert from a central to a wide right role, said: ''I am lucky enough to have had success with the club I'm with in terms of European trophies, Premier League titles and FA Cups.

''But it would be just the highlight, would just top it all off now, by doing well in a competition for England.

''We know we've underachieved so far. With the players England have got at their disposal, we should be doing well, getting to finals in tournaments and winning things.

''I am confident that we will get there, that we will achieve that objective. We will definitely get there.''

Beckham was quick to allay fears about his injured knee although he will make a final decision today and will hold his hands up and declare himself unfit if there is any risk of him breaking down.

He said: ''I feel 95 per cent fit today and hopefully I'll be 100 per cent fit tomorrow. If I was 95 per cent fit I would say I'm ready but if I felt I was going to break down after 25 minutes then I'd tell the manager.

''I'm fairly confident that I will play on Saturday even at this point. I trained a little bit this morning and I feel as if I will be fit for Saturday.''

Beckham will be playing in his first World Cup tie since his infamous sending off against Argentina in St Etienne during the 1998 finals.

Since then he has been subject to an almost constant stream of verbal abuse from the terraces which culminated in the savage insults aimed at wife Posh Spice and their baby Brooklyn after the Euro 2000 clash with Portugal in Eindhoven.

But Beckham believes he is now a stronger person going into this World Cup campaign compared with the one vilified so much coming out of the last one.

He said: ''That was a few years ago now and I've learnt a lot from what people have told me and said to me, and I am a lot stronger person than I was then.

''In a weird sort of way, what happened was a good thing because it did make me stronger.

''People went on about what was said after the Portugal game in the summer and one newspaper actually put on its front page what was said to me.

''But that wasn't the first time I had received those sort of insults. It's been going on for two years so in a way I've sort of got used to it.

''It never gets easy for me to handle but it has got easier than when it happened the first time. I can handle those sort of things better than I could have done when I was 21 or 22."

He added: ''No game against any German team is going to be easy."