England 1-0 Spain | Official Pitchside goals and full highlights – 12/11/11

Frank Lampard nets the winner against World Champions at Wembley. England picked up a memorable win at Wembley in their first outing since a place at UEFA EURO 2012 was secured as World and European Champions Spain were put to the sword by Fabio Capello’s men. On the day the Lord Mayor’s Show took place on the streets of London, it was far from a let down as a hardened and determined display from the Three Lions saw them inflict a rare defeat on a strong Spanish line-up. The match-winner arrived early in the second half, when captain Frank Lampard headed home from close range and whilst the visitors made a valiant effort to get themselves back level, the true English spirit shone through with some characteristic hard work, courage and expert defending. In fact, the rearguard performed admirably for Capello’s side throughout and England could claim to have been more than equal to their illustrious opponents for large parts of the match. As expected though, Spain pressed England high up the pitch from the very start which gave the defence plenty to think about, but at the same time also left swathes of room for midfielders Phil Jones and Lampard to break into when the Three Lions won the ball. With man-of-the-match Scott Parker doing a fine job of picking up the pieces in front of the back four, it was often Jones who found himself with space to run into and on one occasion his slide rule pass found Darren Bent narrowly offside in what would have been a promising position …