Beckham's accurate free-kick picked out the run of Terry, who headed home at the far post after 67 minutes for the first goal by a senior England player at the new Wembley Stadium.

Steve McClaren's men were denied victory in the second minute of injury time when Diego found space in the box to direct a header from a Gilberto Silva cross past Paul Robinson. But Terry seized on the positives of the performance ahead of Wednesday's vital Euro 2008 qualifier away to Estonia - namely the excellence of Beckham, returning to the squad after 11 months out of the picture.

The Chelsea defender told BBC Sport: "David was different class today, his delivery is superb. It was a great ball from Becks and it was about time I scored again.

"We started really well and got a few early tackles in from Stevie [Gerrard] and Alan Smith which set the tone and we went on from there.

"We had quite a lot of possession; we couldn't get through the middle of them and we tried to move it wide. We did that a bit better in the second half.

"We needed this game tonight - we feel very sharp and very fit. We'll take this positive result into Wednesday and we have to go there and get the win."

McClaren took heart from the performance despite the late equaliser. "We got the performance, against a very, very good team, one of the top teams in the world," the England boss told BBC Interactive.

"To nearly get the clean sheet, 15 seconds away, shows that as a team we defended well.

"We saw that attitude, passion, tackles going in and we played good football as well. They came together as a team."

Regarding Beckham's contribution to the goal, McClaren said: "It was fitting. You saw it two or three times and one opportunity went very close thanks to the free-kick.

"We have worked on that [set-piece], coming in at the back post, and JT was there.

"I brought him [Beckham] back because he was playing well. David Beckham is a player who, when he's playing well, there is no better right-sided player in the world. He showed that tonight."

SportingLife