Six of the best
LETHAL: ENGLAND STRIKER PLUNDERS ANOTHER HAT-TRICK IN 6-1 THUMPING
England fans applaud their team after the 6-1 demolition of Panama in a Group G Fifa World Cup match at the Nizhny Novgorod Stadium in Russia yesterday. The win qualified England for the knockout stage of the world football showpiece.
Three Lions in good heart for showdown against Belgium.
Hat-trick hero Harry Kane says “it’s all coming together” for England at the World Cup after Gareth Southgate’s side sailed into the last-16 with a 6-1 rout of Panama on Sunday.
Kane’s treble and two goals from John Stones, with Jesse Lingard also on the scoresheet, meant England joined Belgium on six points at the top of Group G ahead of the match between the two teams on Thursday.
Kane said: “I’m very proud. Not many players get to score a hattrick in the World Cup.”
He said his third goal, which came from a Ruben Loftus-Cheek shot that deflected off the English captain’s heel into the net, “was one of the luckiest of my career”.
His five goals took him to the top of the World Cup Golden Boot scoring chart with five goals in two games ahead of the four scored by Cristiano Ronaldo and Romelu Lukaku.
“It’s going well, there’s still a long way to go, the most important thing is winning games,” Kane said.
“There’s a lot of good players behind me, hopefully I can take it into Thursday’s game.”
Earlier, Kane told BBC TV he was “proud of the boys”.
“We knew it was going to be tough but it’s all coming together. It’s a brilliant result, and to do it in this way is great.”
The Tottenham Hotspur striker said England fans were justified in dreaming of winning the World Cup for the first time since 1966.
“We’re not getting too ahead of ourselves. We’ve got to keep it going but, yes, you have to believe.
“We’ve got to stick together, stick to our game plan.”
England coach Gareth Southgate was keeping his feet firmly on the ground after the rout, declaring “I didn’t particularly like the performance”.
With a grin Southgate explained to the BBC: “I’m being hyper-critical, but I didn’t like the start, I didn’t like the goal at the end. The bits in the middle were pretty good though!”
Asked about possible changes to his XI to face Belgium, Southgate commented: “I want to keep the momentum, we have to think about the team we want to put out, it’s an opportunity for players who need a match who haven’t played for a while but on the other hand we want to keep winning. “It’s a nice problem to have!” Reflecting on a record World Cup win for England – their previous best result was 3-0 – he added: “I was a bit anxious at the start, they (Panama) had six at the back and three in the middle, but once we worked that out I thought we played some really good stuff for 35 minutes.
Southgate’s main gripe was his defence allowing Felipe Baloy to score Panama’s first ever World Cup goal in the 78th minute.
“At half-time we talked about one more goal to be top of the group, that’s why the goal at the end was disappointing.
“It was a big moment for Lingard and great for the captain (Kane) to score a hat-trick, that way he didn’t have the hump when I took him off!” –