Legendary England goalkeeper Peter Shilton has hailed the team as “Lionhearts” and said that last night’s victory saw the “Azteca ghost” put to rest at last.
He told GB News: “We just took the sting out the Mexican side. We played some great football, and of course, Jude Bellingham got his goals as normal, and Harry got his penalties as normal.
“It was just not only a great game and a great result. It’s just lit the nation up, really.
“When we played, it was absolutely roasting. It didn’t look quite as hot, whether it was the rain they had before the match, I don’t know, but certainly early on, especially, there was one or two over hit passes. Jordan Pickford nearly kicked it to the other penalty box.
“It was moving a bit through the air, but certainly our lads didn’t let it affect them. I think sometimes you just block it out your mind and get on with it. We did have to hold on tight the last 15 minutes after going down to 10 men, didn’t we? But we did it. We did it like Lionhearts.”
He added: “I would go along with it being one of the best England performances away from home in a major tournament that we’ve had. Ten men as well in those conditions, the way we held on and showed grit.
“Jordan Pickford made a couple of what I call smart saves early on, but later on he came for crosses, which goalkeepers do, and he was helping the defence out and he was a big reason why we held on.
“I said before the game, in a lot of tournaments when I played, we started slowly, we didn’t play that well, and then something sparked us off, and then in the later stages, we produced it. I’m pretty sure the lads will be up for the next game. It’s against Norway, they’ve got one real player, Erling Haaland.
“Sometimes you can stop one player quite easily, I’m not preempting anything. Let’s just enjoy this result. From my point of view, it has put to bed a little bit the Azteca curse, with the Maradona hand ball, obviously it wasn’t against Argentina yesterday, but it was the same stadium, so I think we put that to bed a little bit.
“40 years ago, where’s that time gone? But now I’ve forgiven, my beef has gone now on that.”