a day ago
England fans let Tuchel know their feelings as humiliation only just averted
ANDORRA 0-1 ENGLAND: Harry Kane scored the only goal in Catalunya as the European minnows were beaten by Thomas Tuchel's side to ensure total humiliation was averted
Dan Burn missed his brother's wedding for this. There were 10,000 travelling fans who probably wished they'd accepted the invitation on his behalf. What is certain is that the honeymoon period for Thomas Tuchel is over before the cake's been cut.
After the Three Lions were booed off at half-time for playing like pussycats against a team whose players earn a living in places like Luxembourg, the Dominican Republic and the part-time reaches of the Spanish League, it took a goal from Harry Kane to make sure total humiliation was averted.
Tuchel is only the fifth England manager to win his first three competitive games. Mind you, none of Ron Greenwood, Glenn Hoddle, Sven Goran-Eriksson and Fabio Capello ever went beyond a quarter-final, so looks can be deceiving. It's a lame excuse that the manager picked an experimental team to face a nation that languishes 173rd in the FIFA rankings and have won just 14 of their 218 internationals.
England were awful. In Germany they would have called it 'furchtbar' - and you don't have to be fluent in Tuchel's native lingo to get the gist. Supporters who had spent plenty of their hard-earned were right to let the coach and his players know exactly how they felt.
The mood lifted once Kane had scored his 72nd international goal - and having already dispatched Albania and Latvia in the first two qualifiers, England will virtually secure qualification for next summer's finals by winning in Serbia in September.
But Andorra must be wondering if they were naive in switching the game to the home of La Liga club Espanyol, In doing so, they surrendered the prospect of testing England on their humble 3,300-capacity stadium in the mountains, artificial turf and all.
Coach Alvarez used to be Andorra's keeper. He conceded 208 goals in his 78 appearances - although he did get a standing ovation from England's fans after letting in six in his final game at Wembley. That didn't prevent him passing down his gloves to son, Iker. The 23-year-old earns his living with Villarreal's reserves and has fared better than his old man in that he's only picked the ball out of his net 50 times in 32 internationals.
It took just two minutes for Jude Bellingham to test him from range. Noni Madueke forced Alvarez into an even better save nine minutes later. England should have scored in the 18th minute when Kane was unable to squeeze the ball home from close range after Morgan Rogers had crossed from the right. But the younger Alvarez was largely untroubled.
He must have thought he'd done enough when England scored four minutes into the second half. Kane was sent through by Curtis Jones' perfectly-weighted pass only to fire his shot against Alvarez's legs as the keeper came rushing out.
But the loose ball fell to Madueke and his driven cross was turned into the roof of the net at the far post by the stretching skipper.
Tuchel's experimental team had Jones at right-back and Reece James on the opposite flank, while Jordan Henderson partnered Bellingham in central midfield. Madueke, Cole Palmer and Morgan Rogers operated behind Harry Kane. It just didn't work.
Jones was England's best performer, moving naturally into central midfield. Madueke carried most of what little threat was on offer.
Madueke almost set up a goal for substitute Anthony Gordon in injury-time. By then many of England's fans were already on La Rambla looking for a bar doing happy hour.
