AFTER 95 minutes of excruciating shambles, England were heading home from these Euros in disgrace.
Then, just a couple of minutes of football later, Gareth Southgate’s bullet-ridden troops had propelled themselves into a quarter-final against Switzerland in Dusseldorf next Saturday.
Jude Bellingham’s extraordinary bicycle-kick equaliser forced extra-time before Harry Kane’s header seized the lead just 53 seconds after the restart.
Here was an exercise in snatching victory from the jaws of utter disaster.
Because England were terrible for 95 minutes. Truly awful.
They had not managed a single shot on target and would have deserved the ignominy of losing in the last-16 to a side ranked 45th in the world.
Southgate somehow managed to watch this sewage show for an hour before he made a single substitution.
There were so many shocking performances that it is incomprehensible he didn’t want to severely shuffle his pack.
He had watched 11 elite footballers seemingly forget how to play football, without resorting to his bench – the England manager’s long-doubted in-game management as bad as ever in his 99th match in charge.
If England do not raise their game significantly when he reaches his century next weekend, they will be sent packing by a very useful Swiss side.
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Phil Foden, the Footballer of the Year who never really does it for England, was particularly bad – somehow straying offside for a tap-in which should have seen the Three Lions level early in the second half.
A first-half strike from Ivan Schranz had sent England to the brink of a defeat which would have been every bit as bad as the 2016 humiliation by Iceland.
Being in Germany these past two and half weeks, there had been an overriding feeling that there was a tournament going on, in which goals were being scored and fun was being had, but that England weren’t really part of it.
Southgate seemed less concerned than most of us about this, naming ten out of the same eleven which had started all three group matches.
Kobbie Mainoo started – as he absolutely should have done from the start – in place of Conor Gallagher but that was it in terms of team changes.
Slovakia had beaten Belgium in a VAR-infested opener but had failed to kick on from that one shock victory and had finished third in their group.
Still, it didn’t take long for England to start making them look like world-beaters.
Marc Guehi, booked against Slovenia, hauled down David Strelec after a hospital ball from Kieran Trippier.
Strelec went close from the resulting free-kick, then Kyle Walker lost possession to David Hancko, who cut inside and shot just wide of the far post.
Mainoo was booked for a lunge in the Slovakian penalty area, then Bellingham scythed down Lukas Haraslin and it was three English yellow cards inside 18 minutes.
Bellingham was certainly getting involved more than in England’s previous two games – Trippier blazed over from his cute diagonal pass – but that tackle spoke of desperation.
Walker was having an absolute shocker, frequently losing the ball and looking like a man who had borrowed someone else’s legs.
England were served a major warning when Haraslin nipped through and had a shot blocked by Guehi before Trippier desperately scrambled away.
And soon Slovakia were, deservedly, ahead. Guehi, struggling badly, lost a header, John Stones backed off and the excellent centre-forward David Strelec slipped a pass through from Schranz to slot past Pickford.
Southgate’s side had been inferior all over the pitch. It was shapeless and panic-stricken. England lacked intelligence, movement, pace and the ability to pass to one another.
The front three were terrible – Kane lumbering, Foden lost and Saka utterly ineffective.
And the back four were arguably even worse.
Only Mainoo, a 19-year-old on his first tournament start, was gaining any credit and the Manchester United kid had a shot deflected wide shortly before half-time.
Remarkably, there were no half-time substitutions
Still, England thought they had levelled four minutes into the second half, Kane’s diagonal pass for Trippier slicing open the Slovak defence but when the full-back centred for Foden to tap in, the Manchester City man had somehow strayed offside.
It was brainless and it was typical of England’s performances at this tournament.
Warming to this theme, Walker played a short free-kick to Stones, who wasn’t looking, and Strellar lobbed Pickford from 45 yards but his effort went narrowly wide.
It was like watching 11 men suffer a collective nervous breakdown.
An hour passed and still no England subs. The boos began to rain down.
Finally, Southgate sent for Cole Palmer in place of Trippier, with Saka switching to the left-back position he had publicly stated he did not want to play in.
Instantly Palmer delivered a fine cross which Foden couldn’t head home.
Kane sent a free header wide from a Foden free-kick, Rice drilled a long-ranger against the post.
But in the 95th minute, England were reduced to chucking into the mixer – and it worked, spectacularly.
Walker’s long throw was headed on by Guehi for Bellingham’s show-stopping effort – England’s first shot on target.
Just 53 seconds into extra-time, England were in front.
Toney, who’d replaced Foden just before the equaliser, won a free-kick, which was cleared as far as Eberi Eze.
The Crystal Palace man’s miscued shot was shrewdly headed across goal by Toney for Kane nod across the line and spark bedlam among England’s disbelieving fans.
Slovakia weren’t dead yet. Their tongue-twister man Peter Pekarik missed from two yards just before the change of ends.
Southgate then risked everything by replacing Kane and Bellingham, bringing on Ezri Konsa and Gallagher, and moving to a back five.
But England clung on for dear life. The lucky, lucky, boys.
