As the Football Association's football development officer, Brooking was part of the elite four-man team that decided to stick with Fabio Capello in the wake of England's abysmal World Cup showing.

But the former midfielder has a much wider brief.

As he attempts radically to alter the entire youth coaching structure in the country, and make it more skills based than results orientated, Brooking realises it is going to take a different mindset to the one in evidence at present.

Brooking despairs for the youngsters from five years and up, who are having it continually drilled into them that results are everything.

He feels there is plenty of time for competition once pupils reach their teenage years.

But Brooking knows that unless the right skills are learned at the correct times, improvement will never come.

"I am acutely aware that there are no quick fixes and no easy answers," he told the Sunday Times.

"But I am convinced that, put simply, the key to securing this future is that we must have more and better coaches with access to more kids at an earlier age.

"The FA invests £1million a week into the grassroots of football but we need the public's support to drive a sea-change away from the outdated image of kids' football in this country - one driven by results with scant regard for developing future players.

"In the last two years, we have totally revamped all of our coaching courses.

"A big part of that has been creating the new FA Youth Award. Over 2,000 coaches signed up for this award in its first year but we need more people to take this course which specifically trains coaches in how to work with young players.

"The priority has to be improving skills at a young age, before it becomes too late."

Brooking is channeling a huge amount of energy into the FA Tesco Skills programme.

He estimates over 1.5million five-to-11-year-olds have benefited from the higher quality youth coaching on offer from a network of skills coaches.

With Tesco confirming their support for the programme for a further four years, Brooking believes the reach can be extended still further.

"This 5-11 age group is key," he said.

"These youngsters must have mastered the basic skills of controlling the ball in their mini soccer games so they can pass and dribble the ball with confidence.

"If not, they will struggle to cope with the tactical demands of 11-a-side football once they get into their teens.

"We have to encourage flair and technique so that as players get older we can teach tactical awareness and good decision-making if we are to stand a chance of competing with other flourishing nations."

Earlier in the World Cup, Brooking claimed that England faced an uncertain short-term future, once the likes of Steven Gerrard, John Terry and Frank Lampard retired because there are no obvious replacements.

He is also concerned at the number of English playmakers in the Premier League that can match themselves against the likes of Lionel Messi and Mesut Ozil, who are only 23 and 21 respectively.

The achievement of England's Under-17 side in winning the European Championship this summer does at least offer hope of fresh talent bursting through, although, as ever, Brooking can only cross his fingers that those responsible are exposed to meaningful senior action at their club, rather than just being consigned to the reserves.

"Returning home with a dejected England squad on Tuesday morning was a sombre experience," reflected Brooking.

"We had left these shores a month earlier with high hopes but nothing compares to the low of a humiliating defeat and an abrupt exit.

"I firmly believe that in Fabio Capello we have a truly world-class coach to lead the England senior team as we now focus on Euro 2012.

"But the nation is rightly searching for reasons why it happened and how we can prevent it from happening again.

"My priority is on ensuring that, into the future, the England manager has the very best talent at his disposal."