Key events
35 min Greenwood’s corner is headed onto the roof of her own net by the off-balance Miller. Schlime had it covered, to be fair.
34 min Parris scurries away from Becker and into the area, but Becker recovers to make an important lunging tackle.
33 min England have had a whopping 87 per cent of the possession.
Wales 0-0 Slovenia It’s still goalless after 17 minutes in Cardiff. Wales need a draw; Slovenia need a win.
30 min “Angles, lines, points – now that was a positively Euclidean goal,” coos Charles Antaki.
29 min There’s a break in play while Dos Santos receives treatment.
GOAL! England 3-0 Luxembourg (Stanway 26)
Georgia Stanway gets her second. This was an excellent team goal. Greenwood and Toone combined to release Mead on the left side of the area. She laid the ball back carefully to Stanway, who cracked a first-time shot through the legs of the unsighted Schlime.
24 min Mead’s corner is headed towards goal by Daly, and Schlime reaches above her head to make an instinctive save.
24 min Mead plays the ball through to Russo in the area. She tries to go round Schlime, who dives at her feet to make a good save.
22 min Russo stabs a short pass to Mead, who wafts over from 15 yards.
21 min: Greenwood hits the post! Mead’s inswinging corner is headed against the post by the backpedalling Greenwood, with the ball eventually rebounding to safety.
21 min Stanway chips a pass into Toone, who takes it down on the chest and whacks a shot that hits a defender and goes behind for another corner.
Full time: Faroe Islands 0-6 Scotland A big win for Scotland, who will join the Republic of Ireland and possibly Wales in Friday’s playoff draw.
20 min Toone shoots high and wide from the edge of the D. England look like creating a chance almost every time they attack.
GOAL! England 2-0 Luxembourg (Russo 18)
Third time lucky for Alessia Russo. Leah Williamson clipped a beautiful cross to the far post, where Russo pulled away from Kremer and steered a close-range header past Schlime. That’s a good finish, especially after missing two chances in quick succession.
17 min Another chance for Russo, who turns Mead’s low cross wide of the near post. It’s completely one-sided, as we expected/feared.
13 min: Good save by Schlime! Toone slides a precise pass through to her best mate Russo, who gets it out of her feet and hammers a shot that is pushed round the post by Schlime. Russo’s first touch was immaculate but the shot was too close to the keeper.
GOAL! England 1-0 Luxembourg (Stanway 11 pen)
Stanway crashes the penalty into the net. Schlime went the right way, to her right, but couldn’t get there.
11 min: Penalty to England Russo turns smartly in the area and is brought down by Have. A clear penalty.
Wales v Slovenia has kicked off at the Cardiff City Stadium, where it is pelting down.
8 min Am ambitious through ball from Toone just evades Parris, who made a good run from right to centre.
7 min England are smothering Luxembourg, who have barely been able to cross the halfway line.
5 min Stanway forces the first corner for England, to be taken by Greenwood. It’s nodded behind for another, which is headed away at the near post.
2 min Almost an early chance for England. Parris’s cross is only half cleared, with Stanway picking the ball up on the edge of the area. She tries to make an angle for a shot but is well tackled by Kremer.
1 min Peep peep! Ella Toone gets the match under way.
Here come the England players, on what is a wet, windy night in Stoke. There’s a lovely ovation for the players, and then an almighty cheer when Sarina Wiegman, the genius behind England’s Euro triumph, is presented with the Uefa coach of the year trophy.
Full time: Slovakia 0-1 Republic of Ireland
Denise O’Sullivan’s first-half goal has given Ireland an excellent – and significant – victory in Senec. It means they will go straight into the second round of the playoffs, and they could* be one game away from World Cup qualification.
Scotland, who will be in the first round of the playoffs, are 5-0 up away to the Faroe Islands.
* It’s complicated
The great Keira Walsh wins her 50th cap tonight. The word on the street is that it might be her last as a Manchester City player.
Wales v Slovenia team news
We’ll also have goalflashes from the huge game in Cardiff, where Wales need a point against Slovenia to qualify for the World Cup playoffs.
Scotland and the Republic of Ireland are already in Friday’s playoff draw, but Northern Ireland won’t be going to Australia and New Zealand next summer. They ended their campaign this afternoon with a peculiar 3-1 win away to Latvia; all three Northern Ireland goals were own-goals.
Team news
Sarina Wiegman makes three changes from the team that won in Austria on Saturday. Ellie Roebuck, Rachel Daly and Nikita Parris – who came off the bench to score in Wiener Neustadt – replace Mary Earps, Millie Bright and Lauren Hemp.
England (4-1-4-1) Roebuck; Bronze, Williamson, Greenwood, Daly; Walsh; Parris, Stanway, Toone, Mead; Russo.
Substitutes: Earps, MacIver, Bright, Zelem, Wubben-Moy, Carter, Hemp, Nobbs, England, Stokes, James, Salmon.
Luxembourg (possible 4-4-1-1) Schlime; Dos Santos, Have, Kremer, Becker; Jorge, Miller, Soares Marques, Mariana Lourenco Magalhaes; Schmit; Joana Lourenco Magalhaes.
Substitutes: Goetz, Weyer, Ludwig, Delgado Do Rosario, Mendes, Schon, Tiberi, Marques Abreu, Kocan, Albert.
Preamble
Hello and welcome to live coverage of the World Cup qualifier between England and Luxembourg in Stoke. It’s a celebration dressed up as a football match – England’s first home game since the joyous afternoon at Wembley when they beat Germany to win the European Championships.
If that was a perfect day, then England are chasing a different kind of perfection tonight. They clinched a World Cup place by beating Austria at the weekend, and now they have a chance to complete an immaculate qualification campaign. So far they have won nine out of nine, scoring 70 (yep) goals and conceded precisely none. Even allowing for the inequality in international football, that’s quite the performance.
They hammered Luxembourg 10-0 in the return fixture, and if I was running my own illegal online bookies I’d give you odds of 1,000,000,000,000,000-1 on an away win tonight. We know what’s going to happen, pretty much. But tonight is about more than just the football.
Kick off 7.30pm.