England on track for Euro 2008

England 3 Israel 0

England produced their most convincing performance of the Steve McClaren era to overwhelm Israel at Wembley and put their Euro 2008 qualification campaign back on track.

Chelsea winger Shaun Wright-Phillips’ first competitive goal for his country divided the teams after an opening 45 minutes dominated by England.

And the same pattern continued in the second period with a superb strike by Michael Owen and a first England goal for Micah Richards putting the icing on the cake and giving the side confidence for Wednesday’s meeting with Russia.

Gerrard appeared to run off a knock to his foot but McClaren decided to take no chances with the game apparently won and replaced him with Phil Neville.

At the same juncture Heskey left the pitch to rapturous applause as McClaren gave Andrew Johnson a run-out for the final 20 minutes.

There was now a carnival atmosphere in the stadium with both sets of fans joining in a Mexican wave.

McClaren brought on David Bentley for Wright-Phillips but the Blackburn player was greeted with boos, no doubt a reaction to his late withdrawal from the Under-21 squad for the summer European Championship finals.

Owen was denied a second goal by a goal-line clearance from Ziv.