Harry Kane scored twice. Croatia answered both times, and at half time in Arlington nobody could have told you where this was heading. Then Jude Bellingham settled it two minutes into the second half, Marcus Rashford finished it off the bench, and England’s World Cup began with a 4–2 win over the side that broke their hearts in 2018.
Kane got the night moving from the penalty spot on 12 minutes, though he had to do it twice. Clement Turpin ordered a retake after spotting Livaković off his line and Gvardiol creeping in early, and Kane simply rolled the second one into the same corner. By the time he headed in Declan Rice’s corner on 42 minutes he had matched Gary Lineker’s England record of 10 World Cup goals, a number that looked a long way off when Kane was a teenager being loaned around the lower leagues.
What made the half so strange was Croatia’s refusal to break. Each time Kane scored, they came straight back. Martin Baturina took Petar Sucic’s lay-off and curled past Pickford’s hand for the first. Then Petar Musa, who plays his club football a few miles up the road for Dallas, volleyed in five minutes into stoppage time after Ivan Perišić had nodded a long ball into his path. 2–2 at the break, and the happier bench belonged to Croatia.
The reset came almost immediately. Bellingham, handed the No.10 shirt ahead of Morgan Rogers in the one selection call that split opinion all week, drifted right, drove infield and beat Livaković low across goal. 47 minutes gone, England back in front, and the player Tuchel trusted over Rogers repaying him in the most direct way there is.
Croatia did not fold after that. They did not score again either, mostly because Livaković would not let them lose by more for a long stretch, throwing himself at everything England sent his way once the third went in. England kept knocking. The fourth arrived on 85 minutes through Rashford, on as a substitute and finishing the move that put the result beyond Croatia’s reach. Saka had come on around the hour, eased in rather than risked, his Achilles still being managed.
Kane takes the headlines and the matchball, and a brace plus a record on opening night earns both. The more revealing watch was Bellingham. Played centrally, asked to be the link Tuchel wanted from Rogers or from nobody at all, he looked like a man who had been waiting for the argument to be settled in front of him. Elliot Anderson and Rice held the base well enough that Croatia’s older heads, Modrić included, never quite got their feet on the game the way they would have wanted.
England have now won their opening World Cup fixture three tournaments running, and they did it without shipping the kind of soft late goal that has haunted them before. The two they conceded in the first half are a different matter, and they will sit with Tuchel on the flight to Boston. Ghana are next on 23 June, quicker and more physical than this. Before that one, here is how to stream every World Cup 2026 match free in the UK, and our running World Cup 2026 previews, reports and player analysis will track England the rest of the way through Group L. Croatia are not done in Group L, and Modrić is not done with England. The thing worth chewing on is whether a back four that wobbled twice against a 40-year-old’s passing holds up when the matches get heavier. What does Tuchel fix before Ghana?
