BRUSSELS -- Former England manager Terry Venables is tipping France to win the European Championship. Venables, who led England to the semifinals of Euro 96 in England, has been impressed by the improvement in the French team since it won the World Cup two years ago.

"France have really impressed me," he noted in an interview with The Japan Times in a Brussels hotel. "I think France will win it. They are better than the World Cup team and have turned into an excellent all-round unit. (David) Trezeguet, (Thierry) Henry and even (Christophe) Dugarry are all better players than they used to be.

"Portugal have also been good to watch and, of course, Holland. Spain, too, once they got rid of their first lineup. I've watched quite a bit of Spanish football and couldn't believe the team. All their best players were on the bench for the first game.

"There's been some really good games. I thought it started off excellent and then we had some indifferent games, but two games last week -- Spain against Yugoslavia and France against Holland -- were top class."

Looking ahead to the remaining fixtures, the former Barcelona and Tottenham boss remained enthusiastic.

"I think there are some good games to come," he stated. "I think it's ended up with most of the right teams there, the teams that can play football, which is great."

Does the hero of '96 think England can't play football?

"Well, you always want England to do well," Venables continued cautiously. "Having come all the way up from the Under-15 level through the ranks to the top, I can't even back against England.

"But I must say, we haven't played like we can play -- we just haven't performed. For 20 minutes against Portugal it was fantastic, but it never happened again."

So, did he think that current England boss Kevin Keegan got it wrong?

"Well, that's the thing about this game; no two people think alike about what happens with the team and ways of playing. We all have our own ideas about the game. Perhaps I would have changed things a bit further back." Venables said he preferred a 4-3-3 formation to England's current 4-4-2 setup.

"I think 4-3-3 gives you more passing options. Our passing was bad because we didn't have enough passing options. In 4-3-3, for example, someone like Teddy Shering-ham would come back to help outnumber the opposition when there's a passing movement going forward. When a pass is released into a wide area, then he's got one thing on his mind, which is to get in the box."

Much of the criticism about the English game still revolves around the lack of skill among the England players. The Paul Gascoignes of this world are all too rare in the English League. Venables says you have to live with what you've got.

"I don't think we can look for what we haven't got," he explained. "There's many ways to skin a cat. All right, you can say we can't do it that way because we haven't got this, but we can do it this way." While in Brussels for television work, Venables also took the time to sign a contract to bring him to Japan for the first time. No, he's not going to take over the Japan national team, but he will be doing some coaching clinics and hooking up with some old friends: Yokohama F. Marinos boss Ossie Ardiles and Shimizu S-Pulse manager Steve Perryman (both former Tottenham players), as well as Sanfrecce Hiroshima coach Eddie Thomson, who he knows from his days as coach of the Australian national team. "Unfortunately, I've not been there before so I'm looking forward to learning about the culture and seeing what their standard of football is like. I think it will be really interesting."

Venables also said he was impressed with Hidetoshi Nakata and was eager to take in some J. League games. "I don't know enough about (Japanese soccer), but I've heard a lot about it and that's why I want to go over. I enjoy new things."

He still enjoys his football, but he's not looking back. While he could pick almost any job he wanted if he chose to return to management (he was even tipped at one stage for the Japan job), he hedges on whether or not he would take the plunge back into management again.

"I don't know," he said. "I spent 20 years as a player and 22 years as a coach and I have to say it was a disciplined way of life, so it's nice to be able to do what I want for a change. But who knows, in two months time I might feel differently about it.

"I'm in and around football all the time anyway. I'm always on television, I do a radio program and a column in a Sunday paper and I've got a project in Spain, near Alicante, with a football academy, golf course, tennis school, 90 houses and a five-star hotel." But wouldn't he be just a little bit tempted to rescue England from the doldrums?

"Err, I don't think so," he replied as football's "cheeky chappy" insulted the whole of Belgium by turning his 8.5 percent lunchtime beer into a "shandy" (beer and lemonade mix).

"I've got to be on TV in a few hours," he explained.