Hail Michael Owen as he scores a double to lead England to victory in tonight’s match against Russia.

My “results” so far at Wembley for England matches have included a draw and a loss so today I was looking forward to England bringing home a win so that my scorecard could at least read 1-1-1. This is the first match I’ve seen England play that has actually had something at stake, being one of the qualifying matches for Euro 2008. Strangely enough there was less atmosphere than there has been in the previous matches that I’ve seen against Brazil and Germany. On the other hand I seemed to be sitting next to some of the more raucous supporters and I’m pretty sure I’m temporarily slightly deaf in my right ear as a result!

The good news from tonight is that England came up with the goods in their 3-0 defeat of Russia. The bad news is that whilst play was particularly energetic and spirited on England’s behalf in the first half of the game the second half was a rather dreary display. The result could have been so very different if Russia’s goal in the first half hadn’t been disallowed.

I felt a little disappointed for the players when the crowd started to leave the stadium about 10 minutes from the end of the game though I could understand the motivation for trying to get to the tube/train as quickly as possible. Once again on leaving Wembley it took us nearly an hour to get on to the tube. Ah well.