\n<\/p>\n
England made a winning start to their World Cup campaign as they overpowered Croatia in a thriller in Dallas.<\/b><\/p>\n
Thomas Tuchel’s side demonstrated strength in attack and frailty in defence, but possessed the firepower to finally overcome Croatia and set the platform for progress in Group L.<\/p>\n
Harry Kane put England ahead on 12 minutes with a twice taken spot-kick after Luka Modric fouled Noni Madueke, Croatia keeper Dominik Livakovic saving his first attempt but penalised for encroaching off his goalline.<\/p>\n
Croatia, always dangerous opponents, were level after 36 minutes when Martin Baturina sent a powerful drive high past Jordan Pickford, who got a touch but could not keep the ball out.<\/p>\n
Kane, inevitably, restored England’s lead three minutes before the break with a powerful header from Declan Rice’s corner, bringing him level with Gary Lineker on 10 World Cup goals, his 81st in 115 England appearances.<\/p>\n
England, however, never looked at ease defensively, Croatia equalising again with a well-worked goal seconds before half-time, Petar Musa steering Ivan Perisic’s header beyond Pickford.<\/p>\n
Jude Bellingham showed exactly why Tuchel selected him ahead of Morgan Rogers with a powerful run and finish moments after the break as the Three Lions established control once more.<\/p>\n
Marcus Rashford, on as a substitute, ended any lingering concerns with a composed finish five minutes from time as England move on to face Ghana in Boston.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
England made a winning start to their World Cup campaign as they overpowered Croatia in a thriller in Dallas. Thomas…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3827,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3826","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3826","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3826"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3826\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3827"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3826"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3826"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3826"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}