TEAMtalk guest blogger Adam Bate suggests England's best strategy for future tournament success may be to give youth its head at Euro 2012.

One of the fundamental principles of international football is that the contest should be between the best team of 11 players each country can put together.

But sometimes a longer-term vision is required and the nation willing to take one step backwards can find itself making giant leaps forward.

The temptation for England - especially given the lengthy suspension hanging over Wayne Rooney for Euro 2012 - is to accept that the current stars are unlikely to satisfy the country's footballing ambitions and instead invest the nation's hopes and dreams in a younger generation.

It's a policy proving increasingly popular among European national teams and one that perhaps England could soon consider too.

For Swiss football, the 21st century has been a relative golden era having qualified for the last four major tournaments. As such, the urge to cling longingly to that generation of players could have been great.

Instead the Swiss football federation has invested wisely in youth structures and this has reaped rewards with an Under-17 World Cup win in 2009 and an appearance in the final of the 2011 European Under-21 Championships.

Helped along by some timely retirements, Ottmar Hitzfeld's senior side have embraced the youngsters, with the coach admitting: "I have no problem throwing them in."

For their Euro 2012 qualifier against Bulgaria in September, the oldest player in the 22-man Swiss squad was 29-year-old reserve goalkeeper Marco Wolfli.

For Belgium too, the changing of the guard has been swift. They took the view that the older players weren't good enough to achieve anything significant, so the argument for holding back a generation of remarkably talented youngsters was a weak one.

Coach George Leekens is certainly confident for the future, claiming Belgium "will be at least as good as the Netherlands" come the next World Cup.

The problem with the Swiss and Belgian strategies is an obvious one - neither country has qualified for the forthcoming European Championships. And this can partly be explained by their youth and inexperience.

Relying on young players can often be a risky policy as these are footballers in a transitional phase of their careers and can be more easily distracted by transfer gossip. Belgium, in particular, paid the price for their naivety - conceding late goals against Turkey, Azerbaijan and Austria.

It seems likely that coaches of more demanding national teams would not be able to afford the luxury of these disappointing results.

Marco van Basten's decision in 2004 to dispense with a plethora of high-profile Dutch players was particularly contentious. Out went the likes of Clarence Seedorf, Edgar Davids, Patrick Kluivert and Roy Makaay; in came Rafael van der Vaart, Wesley Sneijder, Joris Mathijsen and, er, Andwele Slory.

It was harsh on a talented generation of footballers, some of whom had yet to see their 30th birthday. And yet, the new blood were welcomed as a breath of fresh air - right up until the point when the Netherlands were eliminated from the 2006 World Cup and the recriminations about Dirk Kuyt's selection at the expense of Ruud van Nistelrooy began.

But the short-term pain was to bring long-term gain. Van Basten's eventual successor, Bert van Marwijk, inherited a young squad of players with World Cup experience.

Notably, two of the older players that Marco van Basten had taken to the 2006 World Cup - Giovanni van Bronckhorst and Andre Ooijer - were still around for 2010 too, suggesting the coach even picked his veterans well.

It nearly took the Dutch all the way to a first-ever World Cup triumph, denied only by an Andres Iniesta winner in the 116th minute of the final.

Perhaps that's when you need a bit of luck. In 2010, Germany looked set to build their midfield around 33-year-old captain Michael Ballack until he suffered an injury on the eve of that summer's tournament.

Sami Khedira grasped the chance to replace the skipper while Mesut Özil was given the opportunity to take centre-stage and enjoy a hugely impressive World Cup. The young Germany side is now seen as Spain's main threat at Euro 2012. Ballack, meanwhile, has not played for the national team since.

Is there a case for England to be the next country to turn their back on the old guard, en masse?

After failure to qualify for Euro 2008 was followed by an ignominious exit in South Africa, the appetite appeared to be for wholesale change. It's a hunger that has quelled in recent months after a comfortable qualifying campaign with coach Fabio Capello likely to be fixated on his short-term responsibilities.

And yet, in terms of talent, the case for giving the new generation their head has seldom been more compelling. Phil Jones and Chris Smalling can now be regarded as first-team regulars at Manchester United and continue to narrow the gap with the slowing John Terry and injury-prone Rio Ferdinand.

What's more, Tom Cleverley and Arsenal's Jack Wilshere appear to be precisely the sort of players the English game is supposed to be unable to produce - a tiki-taka yin to Frank Lampard and Steven Gerrard's powerful but guile-free yang.

In a modern world that expects immediate results, it would take real bravery to think long-term. As such, it is probably too much to expect England's Euro 2012 squad to be a thirtysomething-free zone.

But the possibility remains that there could soon be a day of reckoning. Will England be humble enough to bite the bullet and learn from a Switzerland or a Belgium?

Possible England starting line-ups at Euro 2012

Option 1: Hart; Johnson, Ferdinand, Terry, Cole; Parker, Wilshere, Gerrard; Walcott, Bent, Young.

Option 2: Hart; Richards, Smalling, Jones, Baines; Rodwell, Wilshere, Cleverley; Walcott, Welbeck, Young.

Follow Adam on Twitter at @ghostgoal and check out his blog at GhostGoal.