England head coach Steve McClaren wants his players to escape their "shackles" and lose their fear after another big tournament disappointment at the World Cup.
The new England boss watched helplessly as Sven-Goran Eriksson's right-hand man when the team crashed out on penalties to Portugal in the quarter-finals.
At his news conference on Friday, McClaren was careful not to criticise his predecessor's approach to the job but he has immediately put his stamp on the position by dropping David Beckham from the squad to take on Greece in Wednesday's friendly.
McClaren also said a change of attitude was needed to break a 40-year drought of big tournament success since their home soil 1966 World Cup triumph.
"We have got to get the shackles off them, to help them lose fear and get them playing like they do for their clubs," he said.
McClaren believes unrealistic expectations surrounding the England team from "the best fans in the world" and particularly the media had not helped at big tournaments.
Under Eriksson, England have reached the last eight in the last two World Cups and the 2004 European Championship only to exit after disappointing performances.
"I think we do have unrealistic expectations," said McClaren. "We have to live with that and I think that living and dealing with that kind of pressure is one of the things that we've got to cope with."
As well as assistant coaches Terry Venables, Steve Round and Ray Clemence, McClaren has appointed a psychologist, Bill Beswick, to his staff.
"Bill has worked with me for 10 years at various clubs. Sports psychology is something I'm very interested in," said McClaren.
"He can make a difference."
Venables returned to the England fold 10 years after losing the top job himself.
Venables guided England to the semi-finals of the 1996 European Championship on home soil before losing to Germany on penalties.
He departed directly afterwards in the wake of much-publicised investigations into his business affairs which eventually led to a 1998 High Court judgement banning him from acting as a company director for seven years.
For much of the last decade, he has been out of the game broken by spells as Australian national team manager and at Leeds, Crystal Palace and Middlesbrough but McClaren said he had no hesitation bringing back one of the most respected coaches in the English game.
"I wanted to pick someone who was tactically astute, who knows football inside and out, who would give me the best advice. I wanted him to have experience at this level, working with the top players," McClaren said.