Captain Steven Gerrard expects England to be involved in a penalty shoot-out before the World Cup ends and insists he has the "bottle" to take one despite his 2006 spot-kick miss.

The subject of penalties has come back into vogue once it was confirmed England will meet Germany in the last 16 in Bloemfontein on Sunday.

England suffered the disappointment of losing shoot-outs to Germany in the semi-finals of the 1990 World Cup and 1996 European Championships.

And Gerrard missed from 12 yards when England lost in similar fashion to Portugal in the quarter-finals of the 2006 World Cup - in Germany.

The Liverpool midfielder believes you can only prepare to a certain extent for penalties in practice as it bears no resemblance to the pressure and circumstances of a match scenario.

But he will volunteer to step forward if England are level after extra-time against Germany or any country as the competition progresses.

Gerrard said: "I've got a feeling we might have to go to penalties at some point.

"As a player at a World Cup, you've got to be prepared for a shoot-out. It's as simple as that.

"We're in the last 16 and the games, when you get further into a tournament are so tight. Hopefully we get a bit more luck this time - and I take a better penalty."

The 30-year-old admitted: "When you practice penalties in training you pick a ball up and shoot within a few seconds.

"But in the World Cup it's a 30-second walk from the halfway line when you've got millions and millions of viewers back home wanting you to score? You can't prepare for that.

"But what you can do is be ready and not shy away from it and have the bottle to step up there for another go - especially when you've missed one before.

"All I can say is 'I'll be ready.' It is massive pressure. I didn't handle it in 2006.

"If I'm put in that situation again I will try and deal with the pressure a lot better."

Gerrard revealed coach Fabio Capello is ensuring the England players practice penalties in the correct manner.

He said: "The manager is on to the penalty takers to make sure we're doing it properly in training and not messing around.

"He wants us to do in training what we do in a game. He said 'pick a spot and not change your mind.'"

Sign up to our free newsletters

Get the best updates straight to your inbox:
Please select at least one mailing list.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails. We use Mailchimp as our marketing platform. By subscribing, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.