England v Greece: Women’s World Cup qualifying playoff, second leg – live

· Guardian-Football

World Cup playoff, 7.30pm BST kick-off ( first leg: 3-1 ) Read today’s edition of Moving the Goalposts on Japan More than 22,000 tickets were issued for this match. It looks like scarcely half of that figure are here inside this stadium at the moment. The atmosphere is certainly livelier than it was in Crete on Friday, at least, and there was a very loud roar for Ella Toone when her name was read out among the list of substitutes, which was interesting. There was a slight feel of England going through the motions on Friday – hopefully they will have a bit more zip and style about their game tonight, to entertain those who have turned up. [On the debutant Lexi Potter] I hope she will bring what she has done for Chelsea and in our training sessions. She’s impressed me, the staff and the team. She’s a big talent. [On the inclusion of Jess Carter] There’s a lot of competition in that position. We will probably be one v one a lot in defence, which is something she’s good at.

1 min England, in the shape of Alessia Russo, kick off from left to right as we watch.

More than 22,000 tickets were issued for this match. It looks like scarcely half of that figure are here inside this stadium at the moment. The atmosphere is certainly livelier than it was in Crete on Friday, at least, and there was a very loud roar for Ella Toone when her name was read out among the list of substitutes, which was interesting.

There was a slight feel of England going through the motions on Friday – hopefully they will have a bit more zip and style about their game tonight, to entertain those who have turned up.

Sarina Wiegman’s pre-match thoughts

> [On the debutant Lexi Potter] I hope she will bring what she has done for Chelsea and in our training sessions. She’s impressed me, the staff and the team. She’s a big talent. > > [On the inclusion of Jess Carter] There’s a lot of competition in that position. We will probably be one v one a lot in defence, which is something she’s good at. > > We want to be more ruthless, and that’s about having the positioning right, making the right decision and executing better than we did. That’s what we’ve been talking about a lot in the last couple of days.

England have two jobs to do tonight. The first, avoiding an almighty upset and progressing past Greece on aggregate in their Women’s World Cup playoff to reach a final tie, should be a formality for one of the world’s best-resourced teams. The second, honing their style to play like contenders for next summer’s World Cup in Brazil, is a far trickier but crucial challenge.

Friday’s relatively uninspiring 3-1 first-leg victory in Crete left room for improvement and England had plenty to work on as they trained at St George’s Park on Monday under gloomy-looking clouds. More broadly, over the next eight months, there are six questions facing the European champions.

Sarina Wiegman makes two changes from the first leg in Crete. Jess Carter and Lexi Potter replace Esme Morgan and Laura Blindkilde Brown. Potter is making her international debut.

Greece also make a couple of changes. Eleni Saich replaces Eleftheria Drakogiannaki and Stylian Katergiannaki is preferred in goal to Fafailia Petaloti.

England (4-3-3) Hampton; Le Tissier, Williamson, Carter, Greenwood; Stanway, Walsh, Potter; Hemp, Russo, James.

Subs: Keating, Charles, Moorhouse, Blindkilde Brown, Morgan, Fisk, Clinton, Mead, Parkinson, Godfrey, Toone.

Greece (4-3-3) Katergiannaki; Giannaka, Gkouni, Markou, Paterna; Brame, Sarri, Moraitou; Saich, Papatheodorou, Brouksair.

Subs: Giannakouli, Petaloti, Fakinou, Ntarzanou, Kapnisi, Chalatsogianni, Drakogiannaki, Tzourtzevits, Argyriou, Palama, Rapani, Kongouli.

Referee Rasa Grigone (Lithuania).

Hello and welcome to live, minute-by-minute coverage of England v Greece at the King Power Stadium in Leicester. It should be a comfortable night for England, who lead 3-1 from Friday’s first leg in Crete, but the venue for tonight’s game is a reminder that the strangest things can happen in football. Greece are extremely long odds to shock England and win this World Cup playoff, but they’re not 5,000-1. Stranger things have most definitely happened.

The winners of this tie will meet Ukraine – who beat Slovakia 1-0 this afternoon to complete a 4-1 aggregate victory – in a decisive playoff. What England really want, aside from the bleedin’ obvious, is to improve on a mixed performance in the first leg. Sarina Wiegman was constructively critical after the game, saying that England weren’t tight enough and didn’t move the ball as quickly as she would have liked.

England know they need to play a lot better if they are to win the World Cup in Brazil next summer. First, they have to get there.

Kick-off 7.30pm BST.

Read the original

People in this story

Related