Harry Kane remains a predator and could feast against Andorra and Hungary as he reels in Wayne Rooney’s achievement
As England’s players wander out at the Estadi Nacional on Saturday night, frown down at the plastic and rubber-crumb pitch, and steel themselves for 90 minutes of heavily weighted professional sport, there will be an urge to take out the low-key international week bingo card.
We know how these occasions play out. Echoey, somnolent national anthems. An early reference from the TV commentator to the opposition centre-forward’s day job as an abattoir superintendent. Gareth Southgate frowning on his touchline, just about lending a due sense of gravity to a competitive engagement with the 156th-ranked team in the world (Andorra are three spots below Afghanistan). And overall one of those strange collisions of attack versus mob-handed defence, when it feels like the whole occasion is being sucked, grudgingly, down the plughole behind one of the goals.
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