World Cup 2018: England 6-1 Panama

It’s the kind of result where one of the scores needs to be spelled out or repeated, just to clarify. Six, yes six one. Five of which were scored in the first half. All of which added up to England’s biggest win in a World Cup tournament. In that first half, every attach threatened goal.

A pair of pens from Kane were dispatched with very non-English aplomb. Hard, fast and humanly unreachable. Lingard had the pick of the goals, Kane’s third an exercise in good fortune. Stones weighed in with his first goal for England, and then his second soon after.

Quite an amazing result. There was even something for the Panama (and Russian) fans to cheer. England make the Round of 16 as the armchair expected. But, on this form, they look capable of going further than the Armchair has predicted…

The Armchair Predicted:

England 2-0 Panama

20 and 10

World Cup 2018: England 2-1 Tunisia

The Armchair was kicking his cushions for most of the second half because he hadn’t predicted a 1-1 in this game. It’s the scoreline at which the last four of England’s tournament openers have finished.

And this looked destined to continue that sequence. England fluffed great chances - Lingard and Sterling in particular. Maguire looked dodgy in the first half, misplaced passes aplenty.

But it would churlish not to credit England with a great first half performance, and to bemoan the dodgy penalty Tunisia were given and the ones England weren’t.

Tunisia got their equaliser and would have settled for the draw but for the poaching skills of Kaptain Kane. With more finishers like him in the team, this would have been a thrashing.

The Armchair Predicted:

England 2-0 Tunisia

8 and 6