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Key events
43 min: Rogers slips a pass in from the left for Anderson, who opens his body and slices a sidefoot wide right. England are soon coming at the hosts again, Kane playing a cute reverse pass down the inside-left channel to nearly release Rice. Zviedris comes out and smothers.
41 min: Saka dribbles in from the right and is tap-tackled around the ankles by a prone Zelenkovs, who is punished with a booking. Saka gets up to take the resulting free kick himself, and doesn’t clear the first man.
39 min: Gordon, his tail very much up, dances in from the left only for his curler towards the bottom right to be deflected wide. He doesn’t get the corner he deserves. Then Anderson swings in from the right, but Černomordijs denies Gordon the chance to meet the dropping ball, ten yards out. Finally Kane whistles a low drive wide right. England pressing hard to double their lead.
37 min: Gordon dribbles to the byline on the left and fires a low ball through the six-yard box. Kane can’t sort his feet under pressure from Balodis, who does a great job to deny the England captain an opportunity to slam home from close range, ushering the ball away to the right of goal.
35 min: Kane cuts in from the left and tries to do a Gordon. His shot pings off a defender’s knee and out for a corner on the right. Rice sends it in, and the hosts clear their lines without fuss.
33 min: In the meantime, Cigaņiks slides recklessly into Spence, who was busy turning him inside out with a neat bit of skill. The Latvian goes into the book and will miss his country’s next match.
31 min: Kane heads the corner clear. Konsa and England were lucky to get away with that one, because the defender’s arm wasn’t right by his side. Proximity his saviour, from VAR’s point of view, allied to an unwillingness to overturn the on-field decision.
29 min: … and here Jurkovskis comes again, down the same flank. He crosses to the near post. Gutkovskis tries to steer goalwards. His first-time flick pings off Konsa’s right arm. Anderson blooters behind for a corner. Latvia want a penalty, but they’re not getting one.
28 min: Jurkovskis tries to make up for his bystander’s role in the goal by racing down the right and crossing to … nobody in particular. But that’s a rare sortie by Latvia into English territory.
GOAL! Latvia 0-1 England (Gordon 26)
Gordon chases after a long Stones pass down the left. He cuts into the box, past the flailing Jurkovskis, and steers a low curler across Zviedris and into the bottom right. Fair to say it had been coming.
25 min: Lewis-Skelly passes infield from the left. Rice intercepts. Had he left well alone, Kane, behind him, would be bursting clear down the inside-left channel. But never mind, because England recycle possession and …
24 min: England continue to keep Latvia pinned in their final third. The passing and probing continues.
22 min: Černomordijs is in action again, heading Spence’s right-wing cross behind for England’s first corner of the evening. Rice swings it in. The hosts deal with it easily enough.
21 min: Gordon romps into the Latvia box from the left. Černomordijs hangs out a leg. Gordon hurdles it and runs the ball out for a goal kick. There was an opportunity to clatter into the Latvia captain’s leg in the professional style, and give the referee a decision to make, but the England winger stayed honest.
19 min: Pickford has a touch of the ball. Nice for everyone to get a go.
18 min: England pass and probe patiently.
16 min: Gordon comes in from the left and tries to score a mirror-image of Saka’s Wales goal. It was more a mirror-image of Saka’s shot on 13 min.
15 min: Kane, Lewis-Skelly and Rogers nearly slice Lativa open down the inside-left channel with some fluid first-time passing. Rogers can’t quite get the ball under control to burst clear. Some lovely interplay.
13 min: Saka glides in from the right and tries to replicate his curler against Wales. Not this time. High. Wide.
12 min: Gordon with yet another cross from the left. Rogers, rushing into the box from the other flank, can’t get his head to the ball. Goal kick. But already this feels like a matter of time.
11 min: Saka crosses long from the right. Kane decides he won’t get anything on target from a tight angle, so cuts back for Anderson instead. Anderson chests down and blooters over the bar. It’s all England in these opening moments.
9 min: Gordon makes good down the left again but this time his delivery isn’t so accurate. Both of England’s wingers already looking lively.
7 min: Gordon scampers down the other wing and cuts back for Kane, teeing up the captain, eight yards out. Kane opens his body and flips a sidefooted effort inches wide left. That should have been goal number 75 in appearance 110. Plenty of time for that yet.
6 min: Saka has another look down the right, and drops a shoulder to skin Cigaņiks. But there are a few other defenders in the box, and he’s soon crowded out.
4 min: Other than that, it’s a fairly nondescript start. “I’m no expert in the Latvian language, but I don’t see any mention of Fifa on their pennant/epaulette,” tut-tuts Jonathan McKinley. “Are you going to tell Signor Infantino or shall I?”
2 min: What a start that nearly was. England’s fastest ever goal, incidentally, was a 12-second effort scored by Tommy Lawton in a 5-2 win over Belgium in Brussels in 1947.
England get the ball rolling. And within 37 seconds, they’ve put it into the net. However it won’t count, because Saka was miles offside when found down the right by Anderson, so rolling it across the face of goal for Kane to trundle home was an exercise in futility.
The teams are out! Just 10,000 or so at the Daugava in Riga, but there’s a fine atmosphere nevertheless. England wear their famous white shirts, while Latvia’s kit is of a lush, vivid, deep red. Then the national anthems. England’s we know about; the Latvian number is slow, steady, stately, sweetly sung and straight to the point: “God bless Latvia! Our beloved fatherland! Do bless Latvia! O do bless it!” We’ll be off in a couple of minutes.
Thomas Tuchel speaks to ITV. “Good pitch … good lights … we have a task that we want to fulfil … we can qualify today … the pitch looks fast … perfect weather to play football … Marc [Guéhi] gets a rest because he is the one who played the most minutes in our squad and very likely will play a lot of minutes after camp for Crystal Palace … we want to play with both of our full-backs … attack with both wing-backs … we have good options from the bench to finish the match and we will use them … we want to push it over the line … it’s the moment … we are here to win … nothing is guaranteed but we want to do it today.”
In other World Cup news, 1958 runners-up Sweden have been doing their level best not to qualify for the 2026 version. Their coach Jon Dahl Tomasson has just been sacked after a miserable 1-0 defeat at home to Kosovo left Alexander Isak, Viktor Gyökeres et al bottom of their group. Now it seems Graham Potter, who spent seven successful years in charge of Östersund, fancies taking charge of the salvage job. Ed Aarons reports.
Pennant Watch. Hats off to the Latvian Football Federation, because goodness me, that is some premium tasselling. Attach a couple of those to the shoulders of a velvet robe and you’ve got yourself one high-end smoking jacket.
Here, meanwhile, the photographer has done their best to jazz up England’s usual quickly-knocked-out, will-this-do effort by coming at it from a dynamic angle. Eagle-eyed pennant aficionados will have spotted that the FA have tinkered with the order of the information under the shield: at Euro 2025, the tournament title was above that of the fixture, while the date was above the name of the stadium, with no reference at all to the day. As with refereeing, VAR and so on, some consistency is all we’re asking for.
Jordan Pickford wins his 80th cap tonight. He last let in a goal at the tail end of cap number 71. Here’s David Hytner on England’s record-breaking keeper.
There are two changes to the England starting XI after the 3-0 defeat of Wales. The captain Harry Kane returns from injury, taking the place of Ollie Watkins, who is no longer with the squad due to a knee problem. Myles Lewis-Skelly comes into a reshuffled defence with John Stones partnering Ezri Konsa in the middle; Marc Guehi drops to the bench as a result.
The teams
Latvia: Zviedris, Vapne, Jurkovskis, Cernomordijs, Balodis, Ciganiks, Varslavans, Veips, Zelenkovs, Gutkovskis, Ikaunieks.
Subs: Orols, Matrevics, Jagodinskis, Grabovskis, Daskevics, Savalnieks, Penkevics, Pulis, Tonisevs, Regza, Melniks, Saveljevs.
England: Pickford, Spence, Stones, Konsa, Lewis-Skelly, Anderson, Rice, Saka, Rogers, Gordon, Kane.
Subs: Dean Henderson, Trafford, Guehi, Jordan Henderson, Eze, Rashford, Burn, Gibbs-White, Bowen, O’Reilly, Loftus-Cheek.
Referee: Tasos Sidiropoulos (Greece).
Preamble
England will qualify for the 2026 World Cup in the USA, Canada and Mexico if they beat Latvia tonight. It’ll only be a story if they fail to do it. Thomas Tuchel’s side are ranked fourth in the world and purring, having recently stuck five past Serbia and three past Wales. They’re top of Group K having won all five of their previous matches without conceding a goal. One of those victories was this one …
… which was an outcome only to be expected against a side ranked 137th. And it’s fair to say Latvia are not in form. They’ve only won four of their last 31 matches, and those against Armenia, Faroe Islands (twice) and Andorra; they were unable to beat the Andorrans at home last weekend. So chances are England will be rubber-stamping their documents for the Americas this evening. Still, you never know, and if you shop around you can get as much as 60s if you fancy Latvia to record one of the great upsets. Either way, fate will begin to do its thing at 7.45pm UK time, 9.45pm in Riga. It’s on!
