England extended San Marino's losing streak to 51 matches this evening, thrashing their lowly opponents 8-0.

Alessandro Della Valle's own goal broke the deadlock in the ninth minute, and England extended that lead to 5-0 by half time courtesy of goals from Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, Jermain Defoe, Ashley Young and Frank Lampard.

Wayne Rooney and Daniel Sturridge added two more after the break before Defoe grabbed his second of the game to complete the rout.

Here, Sports Mole takes an in-depth look at England's biggest win for over 25 years.

Match statistics:

San Marino:
Shots 1
On target 0
Possession 40%
Corners 1
Fouls 11

England:
Shots 28
On target 19
Possession 60%
Corners 15
Fouls 5

Was the result fair?

The stats say it all. England dominated from start to finish and were always going to win this match, the only question was by how much. They deserved to win by such a big margin, and would have still deserved it if they went on to reach double figures, which they looked like doing at one point. San Marino offered very little resistance and can have no complaints at such a heavy loss as they were completely outclassed.

San Marino's performance

Terrible. Yes, they are the joint-lowest ranked international team in the world and yes, they have now lost 51 matches in a row, but it was still surprising how bad they were. They barely ventured into the England half and, in the first half in particular, showed no desire to even think of launching an attack. They were never going to compete with England but, at the same time, they will never progress as a team if they don't at least try to create something going forward.

England's performance

It may have been against the worst international team in the world, but England's performance will please manager Roy Hodgson. They were fluid and played some lovely football on a bad pitch. It is the easiest test they will face, but they still did a very professional job and plenty of players threw their names in the hat for a starting place in Tuesday's match against Montenegro.

Sports Mole's man of the match

Leighton Baines: The Everton full-back is really pushing for a regular starting place ahead of Ashley Cole, and if he keeps on putting in performances like he did tonight then he deserves to start. He was a constant threat down the left flank and picked up three assists in the first half alone. San Marino simply couldn't deal with him and, when he did get behind the defence, his delivery was usually perfect.

Biggest gaffe

This one has to go to Alessandro Della Valle's own goal. It came from a Baines cross and contained an element of bad luck, but the San Marino defender still should have dealt with it. The ball bobbled up at the last second to deflect in off his shin as he tried to clear, breaking the deadlock in the process.

Referee performance

It was such a one-sided game that referee Alain Bieri didn't have much to do apart from blow the whistle to restart the match a lot of times. His most noteworthy decisions were to hand out two yellow cards to San Marino players, both of which he got right.

What next?

San Marino: San Marino will look to end their terrible run when they face Poland on Tuesday night.

England: England have a potentially decisive match away to Montenegro on Tuesday which could see them go top of the group or fall five points behind their opponents.