After beginning his England reign with a routine 2-0 win over Albania, Thomas Tuchel will be looking to make it two wins from two at the start of 2026 World Cup qualifying, with Latvia the visitors to Wembley on Monday night.
The Three Lions haven’t lost a home qualifier since that infamous defeat to Croatia in 2007, and it would take an upset of historical proportions for that run not to remain intact when they take on one of UEFA’s minnows.
Here are some juicy stats and facts to sink your teeth into ahead of the action…
Latvia and England have never met
This will be the very first meeting between England and Latvia, with the two countries having avoided each other in qualification campaigns since the latter joined UEFA in the early 90s, following the break-up of the Soviet Union.
It leaves England with just three current UEFA members that they’ve never played, competitively or in friendlies: Armenia, the Faroe Islands and Gibraltar.
The Three Lions have previously appeared at the same tournament as Latvia, Euro 2004, but the Baltic nation have fallen away badly in the two decades since their sole major finals, tumbling down the FIFA World Ranking to 140th – some 136 places below England.
What next for Kane?
By bagging the sealing goal against Albania last time out, Harry Kane extended his record as England’s all-time leading marksman and became only the seventh European player to reach the 70-goal mark in international football.
Assuming he’s involved again on Monday, captain Kane will earn his 105th cap to go joint ninth on the Three Lions’ all-time appearance list – alongside legendary former skipper Billy Wright, who shares the record for the most games wearing the armband: 90 with Bobby Moore.
And at 31 and, all being well, with another World Cup to come, Kane could very well chase down Wayne Rooney’s outfield record of 120 caps and Peter Shilton’s outright record of 125…
Will Quansah join a growing list?
With the opening goal against Albania, Myles Lewis-Skelly became the 16th player this century to score on their England debut.
The Arsenal starlet followed in the footsteps of Darius Vassell, Francis Jeffers, Shaun Wright-Phillips, Kieran Richardson, David Nugent, Steven Caulker, Andros Townsend, Rickie Lambert, Harry Kane, Marcus Rashford, Callum Wilson, Dominic Calvert-Lewin, Ollie Watkins, Curtis Jones and Taylor Harwood-Bellis.
That number could rise to 17 as Latvia visit Wembley. Jarell Quansah will be itching to earn his first cap – and the Liverpool defender could potentially emulate Caulker and Harwood-Bellis as goalscoring debutant centre-backs.
