England eased the pressure on manager Roy Hodgson as the media widely praised the 2-0 victory away to Switzerland in their opening Euro 2016 qualifier.
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Hodgson had come under increasing pressure after England endured the worst World Cup performance in their history this summer, and had accused his critics of talking "absolute f---ing b------s" after strong criticism of last week's 1-0 friendly victory at home to Norway.
However, after beating Switzerland -- the highest-ranked team in Group E -- thanks to two goals from Danny Welbeck, the nation's newspapers highlighted the contribution of Arsenal's new signing and acknowledged a positive performance from Hodgson's men.
Tuesdays' Sun back page - "SmaSHIN" #tomorrowspaperstoday #bbcpapers #ENGvSWI pic.twitter.com/FdUpcM8Kj9
- Nick Sutton (@suttonnick) September 8, 2014
Steven Howard wrote in The Sun that Welbeck had given the "perfect answer" after he was "sacrificed by Manchester United to make way for the Louis van Gaal revolution" but he also recognised the contribution of his England teammates.
"All in all a very pleasant surprise with England playing the sort of high-tempo, high-speed attacking football Hodgson had been craving," he wrote. "It was also a performance that got the England manager off the hook.
"Like those old hags round the guillotine, we had gathered here to see whether Hodgson could put some distance between him and his critics. Though he had been given a second chance after England's worst performance at a World Cup since 1958, the dismal showing against Norway and an uncompromising attitude adopted by the England manager had put many backs up. The fans were not too happy, either."
Martin Lipton offered similar sentiments in the Daily Mirror: "We will never forget Brazil, the anguish and sense of emptiness they put us through. Nor, surely, will we make the mistake of thinking everything has been put right by 90 minutes. But on Monday night, as Roy Hodgson was rewarded for having the courage to change his England template, it felt that the seeds of a new beginning were being sown."
Oliver Kay argued in The Times that the new-look England showed signs that they could enter a new era.
"This did not just feel like a new start or a step in the right direction for England. It felt like an evening of enlightenment," he wrote. "Excuse the effusiveness, but after the ponderous performances of recent times, last night brought the unfamiliar sight of an England team playing with pace and intensity, taking risks, showing resilience and claiming their reward."
He acknowledged that there had been dangerous moments for a young English defence but stressed the "welcome improvement in the English attack: from ponderous, rigid and stale amid the straight lines of 4-4-2 to the flexibility of a midfield diamond that was polished by two second-half goals from Danny Welbeck."
Henry Winter, of the Daily Telegraph, praised Welbeck's "selfless" performance and wrote: "He now has 10 goals in 28 internationals, and showed his capabilities by Monday night when fielded in his preferred centre-forward role. Significantly, he will be looked at in a far more positive light by those Arsenal sceptics when he lines up against Manchester City on Saturday lunch-time. This felt a watershed for one of the game's most popular characters."
Tuesday's Daily Mirror back page - "All's well that ends Well" #tomorrowspaperstoday #bbcpapers #ENGvSWI pic.twitter.com/lg0FItZD5e
- Nick Sutton (@suttonnick) September 8, 2014
In The Guardian, Daniel Taylor said the promise shown by the players in Basel suggested that England might have performed better in Brazil as a lacklustre 2-1 defeat to Uruguay in the second group game ultimately brought an early end to the Three Lions' campaign.
"The only disappointment for Roy Hodgson, perhaps, is that England could not conjure up this kind of football more often during the World Cup," he wrote. "They have got their European Championship qualifying programme off to a flying start and they did so in a manner that should go a long way to easing some of the negativity that had been threatening to engulf Hodgson's side.
"What a pity for Hodgson that his team could not play with this distinction against, say, Uruguay in Sao Paulo three months ago. Switzerland occupy ninth position in FIFA's world rankings but England made that seem a glitch in the system and created so many chances they probably ought to have won with something more to spare than merely Danny Welbeck's second-half goals."
The media in Switzerland, meanwhile, focused on the poor individual performances of the Nati players and raised concerns over a "50-year curse."
Whenever Switzerland have lost their opening qualification match for an international tournament since 1964, they have missed out on a place in the finals.
Following the defeat to England, the Swiss tabloid Blick focused on the curse with the headline: "Start shock against England! Now, the Nati has to beat a 50-year curse."
The paper also focused on Hodgson's work with the Swiss national team during the 1990s: "King Roy took us to the 1994 World Cup with a 6-0 win in the first qualifier against Estonia, and to the 1996 European Championship with a 4-2 against Sweden."
The Neue Zurcher Zeitung said Switzerland lacked arrogance, and courage, particularly in the first half.
Meanwhile, 20 Minuten said new coach Vladimir Petkovic had work to do to "refine the football of the promising Nati" but remained upbeat: "Not everything was bad in his first match with the national team. And, indeed, in a qualifying campaign that allows the third-placed team to take part in the playoffs, a 2-0 loss against England is not the end of the world, although it ups the pressure on them ahead of the match against Slovenia. A defeat in Maribor would be closer to the end of the world."