Unless Scotland have rediscovered the steely spirit of Rob Roy to go with the engaging but unfathomable optimism of Rab C Nesbitt England are about to qualify for their first major tournament under Kevin Keegan. A place in the 2000 European Championship is virtually theirs for the taking.

All England need to do at Wembley tonight is avoid being beaten by two goals or more. A 31 win for the Scots, for example, and Craig Brown's side would go through on the away goal. Given England's overall superiority in winning 2-0 at Hampden Park on Saturday in the first leg of the play-off, such an outcome is highly unlikely.

In football nothing is impossible but a win for Brown's team must come fairly low on the list of probabilities. At Hampden Scotland's attack misfired and their defence went missing at the most crucial moments. It is hard to imagine such deficiencies being rectified in the space of four days.

Keegan wants to field an unchanged England team tonight. "I think I'll pretty much leave things as they are," he said yesterday. Much depends on Martin Keown shaking off a calf injury. If the Arsenal defender is unfit his place will be taken by Gareth Southgate.

Brown though, has promised to inject some pace into his team in a bid to unsettle Adams and Keown. The Scotland manager is hoping that the twin towers of Keegan's defence have another torrid time at Wembley to add to the succession of uncomfortable appearances there in the Champions League with their club, Arsenal.

Arsenal lost three of their six matches at the famous stadium over the last two seasons with most of the blame going to Adams and Keown, both 33, who seemed uncomfortable against counter-attacking opponents on Wembley's wider spaces.

"There is more space there and maybe that is something we can exploit," said Brown. "Wembley is bigger than Highbury and we have the option of some pacier replacements to bring in, such as Neil McCann, Mark Burchill and Gary McSwegan.

"There was no space at all at Hampden, particularly when England sat back in the second half, and although they are 2-0 up, I don't think 70,000 England fans will tolerate them sitting back to defend a lead."

Scotland's players flew to London yesterday morning and either Burchill or McSwegan - who has shaken off a calf strain - is likely to replace suspended striker Kevin Gallacher.

But Brown - who refuted criticism of failing to make quicker substitutions in the first leg - will resist changing his normal 35-2 formation to a more adventurous 3-4-3.

"I did not gamble on Saturday because I did not want to lose another goal. This is only half way through the tie - the time for gambling will come if the score is unchanged at the three-quarters point. Manchester United showed to everyone that nothing is over until the very end."

Burchill, 19, has only 90 minutes of international football spread over three brief appearances, but he would relish the chance to face England.

"I am still learning the game, but I would love to play at Wembley," he said.

Whatever change is made should not make much difference either to the pattern of the game or the expected outcome of the play-off. Scotland's most realistic chance is to score early and on Saturday's evidence, when Brown's players had an abundance of possession but failed to find the net, they will do well to score at all.

Thus, from a recent position of some peril, England will take the field this evening facing a more comfortable task than usual as they prepare to take the final step towards playing in their fourth successive European Championship.

Yesterday Keegan felt moved to declare that should Scotland triumph tonight and reach Euro 2000 it would be the biggest disaster ever to happen to an England team. While there are several contenders for the distinction it is safe to say that it would be England's biggest letdown.

Indeed Keegan is already looking forward to the finals in the Low Countries. "I want us to do a professional job and finish off what we started on Saturday," Keegan declared, "but this is also a chance to give people some more belief that we can go to Holland and Belgium with a winner's chance. We still have to do that."

What England can confirm this evening is a quiet feeling of satisfaction that maybe the team is not as bad as it appeared early in the campaign.

ENGLAND (Probable): Seaman; Campbell, Keown (or Southgate), Adams, P Neville; Beckham, Ince, Scholes, Redknapp; Shearer, Owen.

SCOTLAND (Probable): Sullivan; Weir, Hendry, Ritchie; Burley, B Ferguson, Collins, Hutchison, McCann; Dodds, Burchill or McSwegan.

Referee: P Collina (Italy).