The UEFA Nations League started over the international break and I think it's something I support.

It's designed to make friendlies competitive and to give it all a bit of a shake-up to make it exciting for the players and the fans and something to play for.

It gives the teams a chance to qualify for Euro 2020 if they don't have enough points during qualifying too.

It'll change things up and hopefully for the better; it makes it a bit more competitive and it'll be a bit more meaningful.

The competitive nature of the games might put managers off blooding new talent but I would go the other way and say that it will give the young players lot s of experience.

Yes, if they're looking for points then they might play safe with senior players. On the flip side, I can understand that.

But a nation like England, if they're good enough, young players get played anyway and if they're good enough, then they'll be ok.

I can understand some countries may play it safe though. But an international manager will learn more from playing a youngster in this type of match than in a friendly.

If you look at how many new players Gareth Southgate blooded during the World Cup campaign – he wasn't afraid to do that.

It depends on results and groups but it shouldn't really matter if you put one or two inexperienced players.

But it does if you put five or six in there and then you lose momentum in your group.

I must admit, this format may make me watch international football more than I have done so in the past.

You'll have fixtures people are interested in e.g. Spain are playing England and Croatia, Wales are playing Ireland and Germany are playing world champions France.

Already I'd rather watch those games instead of friendlies because there's something riding on it, and as we've already said, there's going to be good teams named by the countries because managers want to win and players will want to go.

Friendlies mean they'll more than likely pull out.