England lifeline: We'll complete the job at Wembley, vows McClaren

Defeat for Guus Hiddink's Russians means the fate of McClaren and his team will now be decided at Wembley on Wednesday night, when England face Croatia in their final match.

McClaren will lead out his team in front of 90,000 fans knowing that just a draw will be enough to take England to the finals in Austria and Switzerland next summer as runners-up in their group.

They could even go through as winners if they defeat Croatia — surprisingly beaten 2-0 in Macedonia last night — by 2-0 or three goals if Croatia score.

But if England should lose, and Russia beat Andorra on the same night, McClaren's 15-month reign as England's £2.5million-ayear manager will surely end.

After watching Israel's win on television, McClaren could barely contain his delight.

His joy was in stark contrast to the gloom of last month's 2-1 defeat in Russia and the injury to Michael Owen during the 1-0 friendly win over Austria in Vienna on Friday night.

"What a night! Absolutely fantastic news for us all," said McClaren. "I'd like to pay tribute to Israel for the professional way they went about the job tonight. They showed what a proud nation they are and deserve a lot of praise. I've said several times that the campaign was never over until it was over and that I always believed it would come down to the Croatia match. Thankfully it has.

"I watched the match with my family at the team hotel in Watford. All the coaching staff are also in the hotel and, as you can imagine,we're all delighted qualification is back in our own hands.

"What's really important now is that we get the job done on Wednesday. I know we've made things difficult for ourselves by dropping points early on in the group, but we have played a lot better during the second half of the campaign and I've every confidence the players will do the job at Wembley."

Last night Israel took an early lead through Elianiv Barda to banish any thoughts they might not take the match seriously with their own qualification chances gone.

After Diniyar Biyaletdinov equalised, Israel dug deep, securing a stoppage-time winner by Omer Golan that had Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich, who had promised his fellow Russians £100,000 each to win, burying his head in his hands.