By Mike Collett
England became only the sixth team to end a European qualifying campaign with a 100 per cent record when they beat Lithuania 3-0 in their final Group E match on Monday night.
England, showing eight changes from the team that started Friday’s 2-0 win over Estonia at Wembley, put themselves into a commanding position after scoring two goals which went in off the same right-hand post inside the opening 35 minutes.
First, after 29 minutes, a powerful long-range strike from Ross Barkley took a deflection off a defender and went in off the post.
Six minutes later another well-struck shot from Harry Kane hit the post and struck the back of keeper Giedrius Arlauskis who conceded an own goal as the ball rebounded into the net.
Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain blasted England’s third at Arlauskis’ near-post after 62 minutes as they emphatically made it 10 wins out of 10, the only team in this qualifying competition to win all of their matches.
England sealed their place in the Euro 2016 finals last month and never remotely looked like squandering the chance of joining France (1992 and 2004 qualifying), Czech Republic (2000), Germany and Spain (both 2012) as the only countries to have achieved a perfect qualifying record.
The victory, on a chilly night in the Lithuanian capital, meant England finished the campaign with 30 points, followed by Switzerland 21, Slovenia 16, Estonia 10, Lithuania 10 and San Marino one.
Elsewhere, Russia booked their place in next summer’s Euro 2016 finals in France by beating Montenegro 2-0 at the Otkrytie Arena in Moscow.
Oleg Kuzmin scored his first goal for his country after 33 minutes and they went 2-0 up when Vladimir Rodic sent Dmitry Kombarov tumbling in the penalty area four minutes later and Alexander Kokorin stepped up to take the resulting spot kick as he sent the goalkeeper the wrong way.
Russia qualify in second place from the group, behind leaders Austria. Sweden finished third and go into the playoffs.
Ukraine meanwhile were consigned to the play-offs after losing 1-0 at home to reigning champions Spain in their final Group C qualifying match.
Ukraine needed to better Slovakia’s result in Luxembourg to earn an automatic berth at the tournament in France next year but their fellow Eastern Europeans secured a 4-2 win to make sure of second place.
With Spain already assured of top spot, coach Vicente del Bosque fielded an experimental side at Kiev’s Olympic Stadium, scene of La Roja’s 4-0 triumph against Italy in the final of Euro 2012.
Full-back Mario Gaspar scored with a header on his debut to put Spain ahead in the 22nd minute and Cesc Fabregas, captaining the side on his 100th international appearance, won a penalty moments later but had his effort saved by Ukraine goalkeeper Andriy Pyatov.
Spain ended with 27 points, Slovakia 22 and Ukraine 19 with Belarus, Luxembourg and Macedonia out of the running.
Results from Euro 2016 qualifying on Monday:
Lithuania 0-3 England
Estonia 0-1 Switzerland
San Marino 0-2 Slovenia
Belarus 0-0 Macedonia
Luxembourg 2-4 Slovakia
Ukraine 0-1 Spain
Austria 3-0 Liechtenstein
Russia 2-0 Montenegro
Sweden 2-0 Moldova
