England look to qualify for South Africa 2010 in style

England need little enough motivation ahead of tonight's clash against Croatia at Wembley, knowing that victory will see them qualify for the World Cup in South Africa next year in record time, but Fabio Capello has seized upon Slaven Bilic's comments earlier this week to gee his charges up further.

The Croatian coach, clutching at straws after his side's deeply unimpressive 1-0 victory over Belarus in Zagreb at the weekend, had questioned whether England were still scarred by the 3-2 defeat at Wembley inflicted by the east Europeans in November 2007, and called the English team "flawed".

"I'm very grateful to Mr Bilic because I don't need to motivate my players for the match," said Capello. "Thank you Mr Bilic.He tried to provoke a reaction and it is the best. I have no need to motivate my players after this. It's fantastic assistance. My players are very determined, so thank you."

Capello's charges appear to be fully focused on tonight's game, as driven by the need to win (and maintain a 100 per cent record in Group 6) as they are by the desire for catharsis after the disastrous scenes which followed the defeat here almost two years ago. That match saw coach Steve McClaren lose his job as England manager, and ended with the crowd hurling abuse and jeering the players at the final whistle.

Captain John Terry remembers it all too well, telling journalists yesterday that "I get all the emotions. I've had downs in my career, like the Champions League [Chelsea losing to Manchester United in the 2008 final after Terry missed a penalty in the shoot-out], and not qualifying for England is by far the worst for me. That has been burning away in my stomach for a very long time. I take things home with me. It will never leave me. I wake up in the middle of the night, still thinking about that stuff."

There are no injury concerns for Capello, whose only selection dilemma comes on the right side of midfield - the Italian must decide whether to replace Shaun Wright Phillips, who was quiet in Saturday's 2-1 friendly win over Slovenia, with the Spurs winger Aaron Lennon, who has impressed for the Premier League's surprise package team to date.

England may even find themselves in the invidious position of not even having to win tonight if Ukraine fail to beat Belarus in Minsk this afternoon, a game that will have finished before the teams come out at Wembley. But for reasons of personal pride, one would expect the home team to want to seal this qualification campaign in style. ·