Lampard rescues 10-man England

England 1 Ukraine 1

The Ukrainians took a shock lead when the inspirational Yevgen Konoplianka curled a stunning 25-yard effort over Joe Hart and into the top corner on 38 minutes but Lampard’s 87th-minute penalty spared England’s blushes. Steven Gerrard was red-carded two minutes from the end of a poor display for a second yellow card offence but manager Roy Hodgson was less than impressed with the display of the Turkish official.

Incidentally it was the first time in his England career that the Liverpool star has been sent off.

Hodgson said: “Some of the yellow cards were a bit hard to take and if Steven Gerrard committed two fouls in the game I’d be surprised.”

The Liverpool skipper becomes the 14th England player to be sent off, although the damage is not too bad as he only misses the visit of San Marino next month.

Danny Welbeck could — and should have levelled five minutes before Lampard did but he prodded his effort against a post after Jermain Defoe’s pass.

Redemption came shortly afterwards, however, with Lampard converting from the spot.

But the outcome will fool no one, least of all Hodgson, into thinking that England really do deserve to be rated as highly as FIFA suggest (third).

“We went a goal down to a wonder goal but I was really pleased with the way we kept tidy, kept trying and didn’t resort to any hopeful long balls.

“We kept playing through and creating chances and we were rewarded in the end by getting the equaliser and we might even have got a winner.

“All credit to Ukraine who played well enough. At least I’m happy we came out with something because had we lost the game it would have been very harsh on us, because we certainly deserved at least a draw.”

England laboured until Lampard grabbed his late chance and the Chelsea man, who finished with the captain’s armband after Gerrard’s late sending-off said: “These games are not easy and in the end getting a point is a good result considering we were 1-0 down with 10 minutes to go.

“At the start of the game you obviously want to win it but when you consider the circumstances we had a goal disallowed, we hit the post, so in the end we showed great character.”

Elsewhere in the group Poland proved too strong for Moldova, coming out 2-0 winners, while Montenegro thumped minnows San Marino 6-0 at Serravalle.

ENGLAND: Hart, Johnson, Jagielka, Lescott, Baines (Bertrand 73), Lampard, Gerrard, Milner, Cleverley (Welbeck 62), Oxlade-Chamberlain (Sturridge 69), Defoe.

UKRAINE: Pyatov, Gusev, Khacheridi, Rakitskiy, Selin (Shevchuk 75), Tymoschuk, Rotan (Nazarenko 90), Yarmolenko, Garmash, Konoplianka, Zozulya (Devic 89).

Referee: Cuneyt Cakir (Turkey).