Lauren James helps fire England past China to set up Nigeria knockout tie

Attempts have been made to dull Lauren James’s star, to quell the rising excitement around the dynamic starlet as she has grown and developed. No more. With two goals and three assists in England’s 6-1 defeat of China, and only denied a hat-trick by a controversial VAR call, James helped England make an emphatic statement of intent and announced her arrival on the world stage.

The result booked England’s place in the last-16, setting up a tie against Nigeria and breathing life into a campaign that had yet to lift off.

Many had theorised over how Sarina Wiegman would fill the Keira Walsh-shaped hole in her lineup. During her tenure, Walsh has only been absent three times. Who could replace the influential defensive midfielder who funnels all of England’s play through the middle? It turns out: no one player. Instead, Wiegman rejigged the entire setup to compensate for the loss of such an important cog. Gone was the 4-3-3 formation and in was 3-5-2.

Katie Zelem, who plays as the deeper lying midfielder for Manchester United, joined Georgia Stanway in the middle – no one player could replace Walsh, but maybe two could. Ella Toone, who struggled in England’s defeats of Haiti and Denmark, made way so Lauren James could shift infield into the No 10 role, and Lauren Hemp joined Alessia Russo up front. Jess Carter made her second start, this time playing on the right of a back three with Millie Bright and Alex Greenwood, while Rachel Daly and Lucy Bronze swapped full-back for wing-back. The only other time Wiegman had experimented with a back three came in their record-breaking 20-0 defeat of Latvia.

Wiegman’s reluctance to tinker with her starting line ups has been questioned. The manager only made three changes to her starting XI in the Netherlands’ run to a European title in 2017 and two in their push to the 2019 World Cup final. During England’s 2022 Euros campaign she stuck with an unchanged XI throughout. In those tournaments through, she had the luxury of not needing to change things, and two European championship titles and a World Cup runners-up medal were the result. At this World Cup, the need to rewrite the script came, and she acted accordingly and effectively. If there were questions about whether Wiegman could adapt a team to best fit the available personnel, they were answered against China.

England were rampant in the first half and it took just four minutes for the new formation to unlock a China team that last beat a European side in October 2018 – a 2-1 defeat of Finland.

Russo began the move that would lead to her opening World Cup goal, curling a sumptuous cross towards Hemp and Bronze. It was cleared as far as James who nodded the ball down towards Russo, and the striker fired low into the corner.

It was as if a weight had been lifted off England’s shoulders, perhaps the lowered expectations following the loss of Walsh counteracting the pressure. The assist for the second goal game from James, but it was engineered by Bright, who intercepted the ball and drove through the middle before finding her teammate. The Chelsea forward slipped it to Hemp, whose first touch took the ball away from the defender and she raced through before slotting past Zhu Yu.

Bronze was unlucky less than 10 minutes later, rattling a header off the inside of the post before putting the rebound wide as she was brought down. It could have arguably been a penalty, as could a hair pull on Russo shortly after, but neither incident saw VAR called into play.

The third goal came not long after though, Greenwood’s free-kick from the right was played back to James on the edge of the area and she swept in.

VAR would be called into action deep into added time at the end of the half to chalk off James’s second. Bronze had been in an offside position when the ball was played in but was uninvolved, only collecting the ball after it had come off the back of a red shirt and when she was back onside. Her layoff was curled into the top corner by James but eventually ruled out by the referee.

There was frustration, then, that China were awarded a penalty early in the second half, VAR intervening again, this time to award handball after the ball appeared to hit the chest of Bronze, who had her arm by her side and picked up a yellow card in the process. Up stepped Racing Louisville’s Wang Shuang to put the penalty away and send the overwhelmingly Chinese crowd wild.

Stanway had been replaced by Laura Coombs at half time, her yellow card and England’s lead giving Wiegman an opportunity to reduce the risk of losing her for the last-16 game with Nigeria.

James got her second eventually, sending Carter’s ball from deep in with a side-footed volley. Hemp and Bronze, both on yellows, also made way, for Niamh Charles and Chloe Kelly. Kelly was on the scoresheet within six minutes, James sending a ball forward that goalkeeper Zhu misjudged and Kelly collected before rolling into the net. Daly added a sixth moments later, steering in a volley.

It was thrilling, and England had rediscovered their unpredictability. Stopping James is the new modus operandi for opponents.