England

The England team are in training this morning at St George's Park in preparation for their match against Serbia on Tuesday evening.

All 24 players were accounted for and available for manager Thomas Tuchel including defender Marc Guehi who had been managing a groin problem.

Plenty of laughs and smiles in the group in what looked to be more of a light session.

No long throws on display, unfortunately.

Captain Harry Kane will be alongside Tuchel for the pre-match news conference later this evening.

Sami Mokbel
BBC Sport Senior football correspondent

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Marc Guehi is managing a groin issue ahead of the World Cup qualifier against Serbia this week.

The Crystal Palace captain completed 76 minutes of the win over Andorra on Saturday but complained of the muscular issue at half-time.

The issue is not thought to be serious and Guehi is expected to remain with the squad for the game in Belgrade on Tuesday night.

Nevertheless, it does provide England head coach Thomas Tuchel with a fitness headache as he finalises his selection for the clash versus Serbia.

Guehi is the most senior central defender at Tuchel’s disposal heading into the game following the withdrawal of John Stones through injury last week.

The 25-year-old was expected to start Tuesday’s encounter but it now remains to be seen if the niggle alters Tuchel’s thinking.

Tuchel’s other central defensive options are Ezri Konsa, who came on for Guehi against Andorra, Dan Burn, who completed 90 minutes on Saturday and Jarrell Quansah, who didn’t make the match-day squad.

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Memphis Depay became the Netherlands' all-time leading scorer with two goals in their World Cup qualifier against Lithuania.

The 31-year-old, who plays for Brazilian side Corinthians, opened the scoring by turned in Cody Gakpo's cross for his record 51st international goal.

He then scored the winner, a powerful header from Denzel Dumfries' cross, for his 52nd goal in his 104th cap.

His former Oranje team-mate Robin van Persie scored 50, the previous record, in 102 games between 2005 and 2017.

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Arsenal midfielder Mikel Merino scored a hat-trick as Spain demolished Turkey in their World Cup qualifier on Sunday.

His third in the 57th minute was the pick of his goals as he collected a pass from Lamine Yamal and curled home from over 20 yards out.

The 29-year-old has scored six goals in six games for Spain in 2025, having netted just twice in his first 31 caps.

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Germany manager Julian Nagelsmann made some interesting comments about Northern Ireland's playing style after their 3-1 win on Tuesday.

"It's not easy to defend a lot of long balls and not easy to defend a lot of second balls, so I'm happy with the result," Nagelsmann told BBC Sport NI.

"It's not that easy when every set piece and ball that's free on the pitch they play a long ball and attack with 10 players with the second ball.

"There are always a lot of players in our own red zone. It's not brilliant to watch, this way of soccer, but it's effective and it's not that easy to defend it.

"I think we had 10 or 12 set-pieces to defend, and we only conceded one goal. It's really a strength of the Northern Ireland team. It's not that easy - we have better players but it's not that easy to defend this way of playing soccer."

Germany captain Joshua Kimmich had also described Northern Ireland's approach as "a special style of playing".

Liverpool's summer signing Florian Wirtz was on target with a curling free-kick as Germany won 3-1 against Northern Ireland.

The hosts took the lead through Serge Gnabry but, on a nervy night in Cologne, Isaac Price's volleyed finish 11 minutes before half-time pegged back Julian Nagelsmann's side.

Northern Ireland held out until the 69th minute when Nadiem Amiri capitalised on some rare confusion at the back for the visitors before a curling free-kick from Liverpool's Florian Wirtz made it 3-1.

Right, that's enough long-throw chat for one day. Or is it?

We're going to do a quick round up of the international fixtures last night, but coincidentally Germany manager Julian Nagelsmann has been critiquing Northern Ireland's long-ball play...

And then we'll get into some Michael Owen v Wayne Rooney debate.

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Yep, David Challinor did indeed hold the world record for the longest throw in football.

The defender, who played in the 2000 League Cup final with Tranmere Rovers, registered a 46.34m throw in a special challenge set up at Prenton Park in 1998.

A quick search on Google tells me that the record now stands at 59.8m - set by American flip-thrower Michael Lewis in 2019.

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Football goes in cycles and if a more direct style is about to come back in vogue then my one hope is that is brings about a return to the old fashioned strike partnerships.

Two up front. The big man/ little man combination.

Niall Quinn flicking the ball on for Kevin Phillips, Michael Owen racing through on goal after some great hold up play by Emile Heskey. Simpler times... and they might be coming back.

What? Yes, I am in my mid-30s. Why?

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So what did Anthony Barry work out from watching hours and hours of throw-in footage?

Well, we've dug out his dissertation - titled 'the undervalued set piece' - and here's what he concluded:

"Throwing the ball laterally or backwards can increase throw-in success rates in comparison to throwing the ball forwards."

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No wonder Thomas Tuchel is thinking about throw ins.

His assistant, Anthony Barry, wrote his dissertation about them.

Barry watched 60 hours of footage involving every one of the 16,380 throw-ins taken in the 2018-19 Premier League season.

Jordan Butler
BBC Sport journalist

It is not entirely surprising to see long throws making a comeback, especially with the addition of set piece coaches and the recent sporting obsession with marginal gains.

However, the level at which they have risen might shock one or two.

This season the Premier League is averaging three long throws into the penalty area per game – an increase of 100% on the previous two campaigns and 233.33% more than in 2020-21.

Of course we are only 30 games into a 380-game season so therefore the sample size is small, but the numbers are clear. The long throw is back in vogue.

Alex Keble
Football tactics writer

Throw-ins in your own third, or even on the halfway line, are often awkward. If the opposition chooses to get tight to the team in possession then the throw-in taker tends to launch a looping one down the line and hope for the best.

That's partly because throw-ins require a strange technique that, as we've covered, is under-practised.

Teams could practise cross-field long throws and line-splitting diagonals to break out, as we show in the following examples - all taken from Arsenal's 0-0 draw with Everton in December in which Arteta's side struggled to play with enough speed to work through the visitors.

Why are these almost never seen? Throw-in technique is one reason, but another is a lack of imagination.

If this idea was to take off, the logical next step would be fully-fledged throw-in routines from anywhere on the pitch, complete with runs and decoy runs designed to pull opponents around.

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Alex Keble
Football tactics writer

With the Rory Delap-style trajectory, there is so much more that can be achieved beyond hurling the ball towards the goal.

The offside law is the bedrock of football. Without it, you could just hoof the ball up to the goal hangers.

The spaces would be so big that tactics would become redundant... which is more or less the case at every throw-in.

It's incredible that the offside law does not apply at goal kicks or throw-ins - even more so that clubs don't use this to their advantage.

We've seen Manchester City keeper Ederson exploit this on occasion, once famously assisting Sergio Aguero when he made a sneaky run around the back of the defensive line.

Why not from throw-ins? With one player hanging offside or several at once, teams could either force the opposition defensive line to drop much deeper (thus creating space in front) or simply go through on goal.

Here's an example, taken from Liverpool's 1-0 defeat by Paris St-Germain in the Champions League last 16:

What's noteworthy about the above image is the way Luis Diaz makes a 'normal' run down the wing, as if it hasn't occurred to him he can't be offside.

These kinds of situations repeat again and again, yet nobody thinks to goal hang.

Maybe that's fair enough if the long throw never comes. Just imagine what a Delap could do.