"High Above the Clouds, Our Heroes Shined: Capture This Unforgettable Moment!"

FEEL the pride, savour the euphoria, feel free to declare the rest of the day a national holiday.

Because it is a red, white and blue Monday.

What a match. What heroics. What almost unbearable drama Credit: Getty That may have been the greatest England performance I have seen in my lifeCredit: Not known, clear with picture desk

And that may have been the greatest performance I have seen in my life.

What a match. What heroics. What almost unbearable drama.

This is special. Bottle this moment. Clutch it to your heart.

Because you are going to remember it for the rest of your days.

Two Jude goals in a minute! And a certain goal cleared from the line! Credit: AFP Would previous incarnations of our national team have got it over the line? Credit: Getty

3 – 2 to England after 111 minutes at high altitude against – a side who almost NEVER lose in their noisy home above the clouds.

had lost just TWICE in 89 competitive matches at the Azteca. Sorry señor – it’s three now.

Your fireworks outside England’s hotel all night long did not work (classy behaviour from a host nation).

Your bullying of the ref didn’t work.

Your heart-pumping efforts and dark arts and your high-octane brilliance and wanting it just as much as us – none of it worked.

It was a game when England refused to surrender, refused to be denied, refused to go home.

England were brilliant, of course – dazzling, elite athletes in their absolute prime. From Jordan Pickford to , from Anthony Gordan to the mercurial genius that is .

You watch Jude and you know that you are watching history being written right in front of your eyes.

Two Jude goals in a minute! And a certain goal cleared from the line!

But that was just the opening chapter. This was a story where you often thought – I know how this movie ends. When was booked in the first minute.

England were brilliant – dazzling, elite athletes in their absolute prime Credit: AFP The Three Lions just climbed a mountain that England have never climbed before Credit: PA

When Mexico – often attacking as though their lives depended upon it – pulled one back before half time. When Mexico got their blancmange-soft penalty and pulled it back to 3-2.

And ESPECIALLY when Jarrell Quansah was sent off will still one long excruciating hour still on the clock.

Memories of the young in 2006 and in 1998 trudging to the dressing room came flooding back

To win a knock-out game in the World Cup when you are down to ten men – isn’t that simply mission impossible? Don’t we know that?

Yes – so the Three Lions just climbed a mountain that England have never climbed before. The red card was hard. What followed it was heroic.

The crowd, the altitude, the ref, the waves of Mexican attacks piling into the England ten men – it was a night when there would have been no shame in not quite making it, when there would have been no shame at all in succumbing to such soul-destroying, overwhelming odds.

But England did it. They beat the odds. They beat Mexico. And it was a performance that will inspire generations as yet unborn.

Yes, this was a night that felt like it was possibly going to end in tears. And it DID. Tears of joy. Tears of pride. Tears of wild laughter.

We have, as England fans, taken too much for granted. We have acted as though winning a second major tournament was our manifest footballing destiny. But this is a different England.

This is a side who don’t talk about “football coming home” and all those comforting easy clichés.

Thomas Tuchel’s England speak of POUNDING THE ROCK. And they mean – keep going. Earn it. Find a way. Pound that rock.

No matter how many times life knocks you down – get back up. Because that is what it takes.

Bite down on your gum shield and keep swinging. And they did. Heroes every one of them. Heroes all over the pitch. They did not stop running, they did not stop trying.

At the end of those 111 minutes, they looked as though the tank was running on fumes. They looked somewhere beyond exhaustion.

Would previous incarnations of our national team have got it over the line?

It is hard not to think that the sending off, the altitude, the referee’s home bias – and the brilliance of Mexico’s forwards – any one of these elements would have beaten us in the past.

On a night to remember forever, Thomas Tuchel’s England somehow got the glorious victory over the line Credit: PA Norway, conquerors of Brazil, await in Miami in the quarter-final on Saturday Credit: Splash

We would still have been proud of them. But to do all of that with TEN MEN! We shake our heads with awe.

That was, without doubt, the greatest England performance I have seen since the World Cup Final in 1966.

And although England are still some distance from having a second gold star on that shirt, it feels like winning in the Azteca may even top that rainy summer’s day in 1966.

Because do that with ten men for most of the game…in those conditions…to show that level of fire, skill and pride…wow.

We have come so close in recent years. In the last two finals of the Euros, a second major tournament was near enough to smell the trophy.

Full credit to for getting England to two finals where we came up just a little short.

But on a night to remember forever, Thomas Tuchel’s England somehow got the glorious victory over the line.

This was a game to remind you of why you fell in love with our national game. 111 minutes of live, blood-pumping entertainment that connected this nation to its past and laid down a marker for the future.

, conquerors of , await in Miami in the quarter-final on Saturday.

It will feel like a Premier League game, and not just because and players will face each other.

It will also feel very familiar because, like the Premier League, this is a World Cup where, on the day, anyone can beat anyone.

Norway, then probably in the semi, and in the final – yes, England are a very long way from winning this tournament.

So enjoy this magical moment. Be proud of these fantastic England players.

Enjoy the experience of a bleary-eyed magical Monday morning where England just delivered a performance that will be remembered as long as the human race loves this sport. It was only a game.

But it said volumes about gritty resistance, and about resilience, and about courage. It was nothing less than life-affirming. You get knocked down – you get back up again.

There were so many bitter blows to face – from the cackling crowds and their sadistic fireworks outside the England hotel all night long, to the seething hostility of the Azteca stadium, to the thin air of high altitude.

England overcame it all. They kept drawing another breath of thin air until it was finally done.

Mexico chucked everything at England and we did not bend the knee.

What made the night so incredibly special was that there have been so many times – so many World Cups – when the odds were just too great for England, our England.

But this was a masterclass in the human spirit. England expects – England always expects, and sometimes England expects too much.

But in a seething cauldron high above the clouds, England delivered. And fifty million are singing with pride and joy today.