'I was still unsure whether I deserved to be there'

Aston Villa's Ollie Watkins feels he may have been "underestimated" but is now in a "really good place" after overcoming his own self-doubts.

The striker is currently in Germany, having been called up for his first major tournament with England at Euro 2024.

His selection came off the back of his best season yet, scoring 19 Premier League goals and providing a competition-high 13 assists.

Speaking about what has been key to his improvement, the 28-year-old said: "Mindset is huge. You train every day physically and you can be really good technically, but it takes a lot.

"As a striker, you might not score for three games and then there'll be self-doubt creeping in, in previous seasons.

"Now I'll be calm because I know I'm going to get opportunities and then I'll back myself to score - whereas before I might have been down on myself a bit more."

When put to him that sounded like imposter syndrome, Watkins added: "Even when I first went to Villa, I'd just been bought for £30m and I was still unsure whether I deserved to be there. I hadn't done it in the Premier League, so I would say there was a bit of that before. But now I'm in a really good place."

In the build-up to the tournament, much of the selection questions centred on who would be the back-up forward behind captain Harry Kane between himself and Brentford's Ivan Toney.

"I had a really good year, got the most assists in the league, scored a lot of goals and people still weren't including me in their squads to come to the Euros," said Watkins.

"Everyone has their own opinion, but I don't feel like I have that big profile where I'm talked about. Or where if I was left out of the squad, people would be like: 'Oh, I can't believe they didn't pick Ollie Watkins.'

"I'm happy I'm here now."