Roy Hodgson’s decision to bring a sports psychiatrist to the World Cup has received backing by former England manager Sven-Goran Eriksson.

Dr Steve Peters has worked with individuals such as Bradley Wiggins, Chris Hoy and Ronnie O’Sullivan and was an important part of the Great Britain Olympic cycling team during the last two Olympics.

While in charge of the national team, Eriksson’s side lost on penalties to Portugal at Euro 2004 and World Cup 2006 despite practicing in shoot-out conditions.

“I should have taken a mental coach to train the players in penalties,” Eriksson said.

“I think you need a sports psychologist to handle these kind of things. Roy has done the right thing to do that.”

The 66-year-old now admits that it was difficult to replicate the mentality of a penalty shoot-out in training and this may help England finally get over their penalty jinx.

The Swede added: “Yes, we practiced penalties a lot but it was very difficult to make it realistic.

“I thought we had a very good team, especially at my last World Cup in Germany. We should have gone to the semi-finals — we didn’t, but the pressure on the players, on everybody, was very, very high.

“That was one of the reasons why England failed at penalties. The pressure we had every time at a tournament — it was to be in the final or to win it — nothing less.

“It is difficult for a coach or a manager, you can do a lot with the players but when it comes to feeling that pressure we are not really specialists.”

Eriksson describes the 2006 defeat as one of the toughest of his careers. 

The match is remembered for Wayne Rooney’s stamp on Ricardo Carvalho and the wink from Rooney’s then team-mate Cristiano Ronaldo.

Rooney went into the match as the nation’s hope and Eriksson called the young England striker “the new Pele” but he has since failed to live up to the name.

The match finished 0-0 before England were dumped out 3-1 on penalties.

“It was a very tough defeat. The toughest of my life,” he said. “We lost not far from the World Cup final — the quarter-final once again — and it was finished. It was difficult to go into the dressing room and to know what to tell the players.

“I didn’t even want to speak about the match we had just lost. I thanked them for all they had done for England and I wished them the best of luck.

“When you lose on penalties, you feel sick. It is awful, but it is part of the job and life has to go on.”

England take on Ecuador tonight in the first of two friendlies at the Sun Life stadium in Miami.

On Saturday they take on Honduras before flying out to Brazil where they meet Italy on June 14 in Manaus.