Below-par England laboured to a 1-0 victory over minnows Andorra to continue their winning start to the Thomas Tuchel era.
The Three Lions made it three wins from three in the Barcelona sunshine under Gareth Southgate’s successor to following opening March wins at Wembley over Albania and Latvia, with Harry Kane on target with his 450th career goal as they maintained control of Group K on the road to next summer’s World Cup.
However, scoring just once against the nation ranked 173rd in the world by FIFA will undoubtedly raise questions for a team that have designs on winning the tournament in the United States, Mexico and Canada in 2026, even if the rigours of a long and taxing season and the Spanish heat and humidity can perhaps be used as legitimate mitigating factors for such a disappointing display.
An extremely ponderous first half from England was mostly devoid of highlights, save for some bright spells from the likes of Morgan Rogers, Jude Bellingham and particularly Noni Madueke, their best player on the day.
They dominated possession from the outset as expected but were not moving the ball nearly quickly enough against a resolute low block as they looked lethargic, with Iker Alvarez only making a handful of comfortable saves in the Andorra goal.
However, it took just five minutes of the second half for the deadlock to finally be broken, Kane stretching to fire Madueke’s low cross into the roof of the net at the back post.
You wondered if the floodgates might open from there as Andorra potentially tired, but England continued to look disconnected and disjointed in attack, substitute Eberechi Eze having their best chance to double the advantage when his close-range header from a deft Bellingham cross was tipped over well by Iker Alvarez.
England were forced to negotiate a few second-half scares as Ricard Fernandez and Guillaume Lopez offered Andorra’s best attacking hope, Ezri Konsa providing a crucial block to thwart the latter inside the box.
Tuchel also sent for the likes of Trent Alexander-Arnold, Declan Rice and Anthony Gordon in a bid to finish with a flourish, but Gordon and Madueke somehow failed to combine to score in the final seconds in a mishap that rather summed up their frustrating evening.
