England go marching on | England 6 Andorra 0 | How England rated | How the action unfolded |
Matt Dickinson | Patrick Barclay | GIles Smith | Debate: is Rooney vital to England chances? |
Graphic: talking England tactics | Graphic: just the ticket |
Wayne Rooney hailed Fabio Capello as the inspiration behind England’s remarkable transformation from European Championship flops to World Cup contenders after a 6-0 win over Andorra last night took them to the brink of next year’s finals.
Rooney and Jermain Defoe scored two goals each, while Frank Lampard and Peter Crouch also got on the scoresheet as England powered to a seventh successive qualifying win on the road to South Africa in front of 57,897 at Wembley. Given the transport chaos caused by a strike on London Underground, the attendance represented a victory in itself for the Football Association.
England need four points from their last three group six matches to make mathematically certain of their place at the World Cup finals, which begin in Johannesburg a year today, although victory in their next match, at home to Croatia on September 9, will all but take them through with two games to spare.
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England’s players would take great satisfaction from qualifying in such a fashion, almost two years after Croatia celebrated wildly at Wembley after denying Steve McClaren’s side a place at Euro 2008.
“The manager has got us playing as a team,” Rooney said. “The disappointment of not getting to the Euros is still very much in the players’ minds and the manager and his coaching staff coming in have been a big plus.
“We’re playing more as a team now and we’re winning games. Certainly, not qualifying motivated me and, speaking to other players, I’m sure it’s the same for them.
“We’ve won our first seven games in qualifying and we’ve got one foot already in the World Cup finals. Hopefully we’ll get there in our next game. It’s been quite a hard preparation and we face another long season next year, but I’m sure we’ll be ready and prepared for that when it comes round.”
Rooney began the rout with a fourth-minute header, adding his tenth goal in seven England matches before half-time to take him to fourth in the list of his country’s competitive goalscorers with 16 in 32 games. The Manchester United striker also moved alongside Geoff Hurst with 24 goals in all matches, but has already set his sights on passing Bobby Charlton’s record of 49 goals for his country. At 23, time is on his side.
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“I hope I can beat it,” Rooney said. “Obviously it would be a great achievement, but I’ve always said I never based my game just on scoring goals. It’s very much about getting on the ball and being involved.”
Capello has always had a special affinity with Rooney and joked that he deserved a holiday after substituting him at half-time, with his replacement, Defoe, scoring twice in three minutes. The Italian also praised England’s supporters for overcoming difficult travelling conditions to get to the ground in numbers.
“I’m happy for the fans who came here as they arrived here with some problems,” Capello said. “For us the crowd are very important and we played well for these people. I think we have to win another game to be sure to go to South Africa, but I’m happy today.
“We started very strong and it was almost a perfect performance. Always when you play a team that aren’t strong you have to start well, quickly. You have to press and win back the ball. I think we have created a group, which is important. We have the spirit. We always play to win.”