Raymond Verheijen has told TEAMtalk about his role as Wales assistant, his thoughts on coaching in the UK and England's Euro 2012 chances.

Verheijen has worked with the Holland, South Korea, Russia and Wales national sides, as well as Rangers, Barcelona, Manchester City and Chelsea among others at club level.

Wales have risen to 45th in the world rankings, their best position in 17 years, with Verheijen as part of the team.

TT: Your official title within the Wales set-up is assistant manager, yet you only work for the FAW on a part-time basis. Can you explain to us your role please?

RV: I work with Wales on a consultancy basis because of all the other things I'm doing all over the world. I'm not really an employee of the FAW because that wouldn't allow me to work with other associations because of potential conflicts of interest so I'm working as a consultant with the FAW and I'm also an advisor to the Turkish [and also Australian] FA.

TT: The improvement in the Wales team since you've been involved has been significant - how much of a part have you played in that?

RV: Myself and Gary Speed have implemented all kinds of things that we have learned from other people. First we developed the structure and the playing style and hopefully we can progress even further and make a good start to the World Cup qualifying next year.

TT: And that playing style is one in which the players are encouraged to pass the ball?

RV: As Johan Cruyff once said, if you have the ball the opponent can't score. What we did with Wales was exaggerate the passing game.

In the game against England at the Millennium Stadium in March we told the players to keep the ball on the ground and not kick it long, even when England pressure you, which was a really hard thing for them to do.

We were a little bit unlucky to concede two goals in the first 10 minutes but afterwards we said to the players that in six or 12 months' time they will look back at that game and see that it was such good practice in terms of keeping the ball on the ground under maximum pressure, and six months later at Wembley you could see that our players were so much more comfortable on the ball, Our passing game, especially in the second half, was just great to watch.

TT: Obviously a great deal of credit must also go to Gary Speed.

RV: Gary is a manager with enormous potential because of his playing career and that is one of the reasons why I took the job. From the first moment I spoke to Gary I could sense his potential as a manager.

At the same time he was looking for someone with experience of national sides all over the world and different playing styles so that is the fundament of our co-operation.

Somebody told me this week that Wales has made the biggest rise in the world rankings in history so that is encouraging for us.

TT: England claimed an impressive win over Spain on Saturday but can we compete for the title at the European Championships?

RV: Germany, Spain and Holland are the three favourites - Spain obviously because they are the reigning champions - but I think Germany has a great chance to win the Euros.

I don't think England will be one of the favourites simply because they're not good enough if you compare them with Spain, with Holland, with Germany. However, I think they have a great young generation that is developing so I think in the future they will be one of the contenders - but they still have to catch up with the top teams in Europe.

TT: A lot of people blame our failure at international level on the standard of coaching in the country; do you think there is some truth in that?

RV: From what I hear, for too long coaches in England have been focusing on themselves too much and not been open to influences from outside.

I think that is changing rapidly, though, and I think a lot of coaches and managers in the UK are starting to listen to and learn from training methods from outside.

If you look at Spain and Germany, a lot of things have changed in coaching in those countries in the last 10 years and people in the UK have noticed that as so I think coaches in the country will open up and learn from people abroad.

TT: Which brings us nicely to your new venture, the UK Football Academy. Tell us more.

RV: The UK Football Academy is part of a bigger global project called the World Football Academy. A couple of years ago with Guus Hiddink we were talking about his legacy and giving something back to the game and we started to think about developing a Dutch football academy, which we did in 2009, and now we're taking this concept to the UK mainly because of Guus' great experience with Chelsea over here.

Guus and myself have travelled all over the world and met some great coaches, and the two of us have experience ourselves of how much you can learn from different coaches. The concept of the Football Academy is to bring those experts to one place so the people in a particular country get access to the best experts.

TT: It's the actual coaches rather than the players that the academy aims to develop then?

RV: Yes, the coaches get the opportunity to develop themselves and to specialise in certain areas, but hopefully they will take that to the training ground so ultimately the young players also feel the benefit of this initiative.

It's about experts all over the world wanting to help coaches because what you often see in football is that you have to work at the highest level to get access to the best experts. We want people working at a lower level but with the ambition and the potential to work at the highest level to still get access to the best experts.

TT: Sam Allardyce is the UK ambassador for the scheme and he'll be one of the speakers at the academy's launch symposium in February.

RV: Guus Hiddink is our worldwide ambassador and within the UK we have asked Sam Allardyce to be our UK ambassador because he is one of the most forward-thinking managers in the UK and our mission really fits into his managerial style.

The interview was hosted by Sky Sports News Radio and for the latest sports news click here.

People can find out information on our website about the launch symposium we're holding at the Emirates Stadium on February 8 where Guus, Sam Allardyce and Gary Speed will all speak, and also all the information about all the one-day courses we will hold across the UK.