12 November 28, 2021The Sunday Times V2
Football Women's World Cup qualifying
A
new era for England has
begun under manager
Sarina Wiegman, and yet, in
their toughest test so far,
they relied on a familiar
goalscorer: Ellen White.
On a landmark afternoon
for the 32-year-old, winning
her 100th cap, White marked the
occasion with a typically clinical fin-
ish. She is now only two goals away
from breaking the all-time England
women’s goalscoring record, held by
Kelly Smith with 46.
While England were missing Steph
Houghton, Lucy Bronze and Ellie Roe-
buck through injury, White’s experi-
ence appears as important as ever. As
so often in the 2019 World Cup, the last
time England played truly competitive
fixtures, an unconvincing perform-
ance was saved by her goalscoring.
For now, that is more than ade-
quate for England to ease through
World Cup qualifying, still unbeaten
and top of group D, yet to concede aWhite closes in on goal record in 100th game
supporting White in attack. Their
partnership produced the pivotal
goal, albeit with some kind ricochets.
Kirby’s shot was blocked but the
rebound fell back to her, before her
pass to White took a deflection and
the striker clinically finished.
“I’ve learnt to know Ellen as a real
professional player,” Wiegman said.
“A terrific team player, the consist-
ency she brings, still she wants to
become better every day. That’s just
really special. It’s a really great
acknowledgement [to score on her
100th cap].”
Austria began the second half with
renewed impetus, Sarah Zadrazil, the
Bayern Munich midfielder, testing
Mary Earps from range, before Maria
Plattner forced her to tip an effort
away for a corner — saves Wiegman
called “difference-makers”, before
England survived a nervy finish to
preserve their 100 per cent record.Star player Fran Kirby (England).
England (4-3-3): M Earps 8 — R Daly 6, M Bright 7,
A Greenwood 6, D Stokes 6 (J Carter 90+2min) —
K Walsh 7, E Toone 5 (G Stanway 63, 6), F Kirby 8
— B Mead 6 (N Parris 70, 6), E White 8, L Hemp 6.
Austria (4-3-3): M Zinsberger 8 — L Wienroither 6,
C Wenninger 6, V Kirchberger 6, V Hanshaw 6 — S
Zadrazil 7, S Puntigam 6, M Plattner 7
(M Höbinger 90) — B Dunst 6, N Billa 6 (S Enzinger
87), K Naschenweng 5 (K Wienerroither 59, 6).
Booked Wienerroither.
Referee K Monzul. Attendance 9,159.goal. They will play minnows Latvia
on Tuesday, where White will hope to
break Smith’s record.
“It is a dream really,” White said of
her 100th cap. “It has come full circle
with me making my debut against Aus-
tria and my 100th appearance against
them today, which is strange. I just
wanted the team to win.
“We needed really good game man-
agement and there were times we
didn’t play our best football but we
had to stay in the game and I think we
did that.”
Storm Arwen had almost pre-
vented White reaching a century of
appearances at the Stadium of Light,
causing red travel warnings and bring-
ing the local Metro to a halt.
Wiegman had warned her side to
expect the most difficult test of her
reign so far, but that was not a grand
statement considering that in her first
four matches in charge — all World
Cup qualifiers — England had scored
32 goals and conceded none against
part-time opposition in North Mace-
donia, Luxembourg, Northern Ire-
land and Latvia.
England had not even conceded a
corner in those four matches — but
Austria forced one in the opening sec-
onds. They are ranked 21st in the
world by Fifa and reached the semi-fi-White needs
one more goal
to equal the
women’s
recordMolly Hudson
ANNA GOWTHORPEENGLAND
White 39 1AUSTRIA
0P W D L F AGD PtsEngland 55 0 03303315Austria 53 1 1 2141710N Ireland 53 1 1 2161510Luxembourg 4 1 0 3 3 21 -18 3N Macedonia 5 1 0 4 6 29 -23 3Latvia 4 0 0 4 2 26 -24 0nals of the last European Champion- GROUP D
ship, yet Wiegman still opted for an
attacking line-up.
A midfield trio of Keira Walsh, Fran
Kirby and Ella Toone featured only
Walsh as a regular midfielder, Kirby
and Toone more suited as forwards.
Kirby had spoken in the week of the
“tough” transition between her club
and country role, but here she was
able to find a balance between both:
deeper when in possession, while