Aston Villa captain Stiliyan Petrov says England will never be competitive at tournaments until the Premier League introduces a winter break.
Petrov believes Fabio Capello has deeper concerns than finding new players to revitalise his team.
He said: "I wasn't surprised at England's performance in South Africa because if you look at most of the players, the amount of games they had played is unbelievable.
"Every single country has a winter break, they have two or three weeks at Christmas and New Year, but in that time the English probably play 11 or 12 games and that's really hard for them.
"They are human. You can see Wayne Rooney and how he was outstanding during the season, but then in the World Cup he wasn't sharp at all. But if you understand the amount of games he played in the season I think it's normal.
"We tried a winter break in Scotland when I was playing for Celtic and it was great for clearing up injuries - and if England want to do something at a big tournament they should think about how they get their players fit and ready for it.
"They need to be fresh. Look how fresh other teams were and it wasn't surprising, to be honest, that England struggled."
