England reached their eighth successive World Cup at a canter as Thomas Tuchel’s improving side thrashed Latvia 5-0 in Riga to qualify with two games to spare.
The Three Lions made light work of their Baltic opponents in their first-ever meeting and for the third game in a row were 3-0 up at half-time with one eye on next summer’s finals in the USA, Canada and Mexico.
The irrepressible Harry Kane played a large part in their half-time dominance thanks to a quick-fire double, first curling home from the edge of the box before adding a penalty he won himself with help from a VAR review for his 76th international goal.
Again, England enjoyed near-total dominance and found none of the same difficulty in some of Tuchel’s earlier games to break down defensive opponents, and even had the ball in the net inside the first minute through Kane before an offside flag against Bukayo Saka cut short their celebrations.
England remained patient where they may have once lost concentration and took advantage of a rare Latvia attack to spring their opener on the counter, with John Stones’ ball into the channel inviting Anthony Gordon to use his pace to cut inside and bend in a fine strike for his second international goal.
Anthony Gordon’s strike was just his second goal for England
As Latvia spent most of the rest of the half proving increasingly stubborn the travelling support instead began to playfully goad Tuchel after his criticism of England’s home support against Wales with chants including “Tuchel, give us a song!” and “1-0 to the library”.
Their attention turned back to the pitch moments before the interval when Kane, who had already missed two previous presentable chances, buried the hardest of the three on his left foot with a textbook placed finish from 20 yards.
That was only part of a collapse labelled “madness” by Sky Sports’ Roy Keane at half-time, aimed largely at a mindless shirt pull on Kane in the Latvia box seconds before the break which was always likely to be picked up by VAR. The skipper duly netted his 24th England penalty from 28 attempts to put England out of sight.
With keeping focus England’s toughest opponent after the break Ezri Konsa was caught flat-footed by Vladislavs Gutkovskis but recovered superbly to deny the hosts’ top goalscorer with a magnificent sliding challenge as he shaped to shoot.
It was soon back to business as usual as an inviting Djed Spence cross was flapped at by Krisjanis Zviedris and unwittingly turned into his own net by Maksims Tonisevs, before substitute Eberechi Eze gave Tuchel a reminder of his quality with a late fifth from Jarrod Bowen’s ball.
More to follow…
The draw for the 2026 World Cup will take place in Washington on December 5.
President Trump will join FIFA President Gianni Infantino at the John F Kennedy Center – a performing arts venue where Trump is chairman – to decide the group stage fixtures.
Announcing the draw venue at the White House in August, Trump said the World Cup was “the biggest event in sports”, while Infantino declared the 104 matches would be like “104 Super Bowls”.
The draw will take place from 12pm local time (5pm UK time).
The 2026 FIFA men’s World Cup takes place from June 11 to July 19, 2026.
It will be the 23rd edition of the tournament.
