England’s Watkins scores on full debut

FORMER Exeter City academy graduate Ollie Watkins marked his first England start with his second goal in Tuesday night’s win over Ivory Coast at Wembley Stadium, writes Daniel Clark.

The Aston Villa man scored on his debut against San Marino last March, and in what was his seventh cap for his country, he doubled his tally in the victory.

It was the first time the 26-yearold has been involved from the off, and with 30 minutes on the clock, he opened the scoring at Wembley. It was a close range finish, created by captain for the night, Raheem Sterling.

Former Tottenham defender Serge Aurier was shown a second yellow card for dissent - five minutes before the break - before the Manchester City man doubled the lead on the stroke of half-time. Tyrone Mings sealed it in secondhalf stoppage time with a later header.

England boss Gareth Southgate was impressed by Watkins’ performance before he was replaced by Harry Kane in the 62nd minute, and said he has shown he can provide a different attacking threat.

“What you know with Ollie is that he is going to work defenders and is going to press people really well,” the England manager said. “It gives us a different profile to Harry (Kane) and Tammy (Abraham), so he will be pleased with his week’s work.”

And his cap and goal was good news for Exeter City as the Grecians receive 15 per cent of any potential additional payments to Brentford from Aston Villa as part of add-ons agreed when he left St James Park back in 2017 to join the Bees.

Having banked £37,500 on Saturday when Watkins made a late cameo off the bench in the 2-1 friendly win over Switzerland, a further £75,000 will come City’s way after Watkins was named in the starting line-up.

It means the Grecians have so far secured £525,000 in add-ons out of a maximum £750,000 they can receive.