This was the best England performance for a long time and the perfect way to go into a New Year that could be so important for English football. Alf Ramsey decided to try a new and effective 4-3-3 formation. Dispensing with traditional wingers, he played with four players across the middle and allowed each of the four a free hand in supporting the front runners.

It proved to be classic stuff and within 20 minutes of the start it was obvious which team would win.

England began superbly and after ten minutes they took a deserved lead. A clever free-kick movement involving Bobby Charlton, George Eastham and Ray Wilson ended with the left-back whipping over a centre which was cleverly touched home by Joe Baker.

The number-nine was then desperately unlucky to pull a leg muscle on the half-hour and he limped off to be replaced by debutant Norman Hunter. Thankfully, the changes did not have an adverse effect on the England display and throughout the remainder of the first half they showed all the pace, quality and ideas.

The bemused Spaniards tried desperately to work out what was happening. The full-backs, Reija and Sanchís, were particularly baffled at having no wingers to mark. Incidentally, Spain, too, were trying to rebuild a side, having lost 'superstar' players like Di Stefano, Gento and others. Losing quality like that was a big blow and one from which they were struggling to recover.

Before half-time Spain brought on Neme for outside-left Lapetra but England were full value for their one-goal lead and their only disappointment was that they did not have more goals to show for their superiority.

The second half continued in the same vein with England comfortably controlling the play. Several chances came and went before they deservedly sealed the game with a second goal. It came on the hour and ended a fine move between Bobby Moore, George Cohen and Moore again. The captain's final square pass was turned in by Roger Hunt and the mesmerized Spaniards' resistance was finally over.

England swarmed around the Spanish goal in the remaining half-hour and could have had several more goals. Hunt missed twice and Alan Ball, who covered every blade of this Madrid grass, came so close to making it 3-0.

It really was a hearwarming end to the year and England could now move with confidence into 1966.
  

One of the most significant games in Alf Ramsey's managerial life. He gave full rein to his 4-3-3 formation for the first time following the experiment in Nuremburg, and the resounding victory convinced him that he had found the tactics best suited to England for the World Cup. The defence was as it would appear throughout the World Cup finals – Banks behind a back line of Cohen, Jack Charlton, Moore and Wilson. Stiles patrolled the midfield as a ball winner alongside the fetch and carrying Alan Ball, with George Eastham orchestrating things from a deep position in centre midfield (the role that would eventually become Bobby Charlton's). Here in Spain Bobby wore the number eleven jersey and was delegated an attacking role alongside out-and-out strikers Roger Hunt and Joe Baker, who spoke with such a heavy Scottish accent that many of his colleagues could not always understand him. It was Baker who gave England an early lead on a pitch soaked by melting snow before limping off in the thirty-fifth minute with a pulled muscle. Norman 'Bites Yer Legs' Hunter became the first England player to make his debut as a substitute. Alan Ball famously put his hands together as Hunter came on to the pitch, and said; "For what they are about to receive!" Roger Hunt clinched victory with a classic goal on the hour after  a sweeping length-of-the-pitch passing movement involving George Cohen, Bobby Charlton and Bobby Moore. The Liverpool striker was making a strong challenge for the England jersey usually worn by the absent, unwell Greaves.
  

England gained her first-ever victory in a full international in Spain when they were victorious in Madrid on a bitterly cold night on 8 December. It was the first of three additional matches arranged for the full team as part of the World Cup preparations. A new forward-line was on duty for this game but the 4-3-3 tactics adopted meant that the numbers worn by the players bore no relation to their position on the field. It was a revelation to the many foreign observers present, who praised England's performance for its ingenuity and simplicity. Spain were, in fact, completely bamboozled by it and were utterly defeated at the end. The margin of success might well have been greater if Baker had not been forced to leave the field with a pulled thigh-muscle in the thirty-fifth minute. In some respects it was a blessing in disguise because it allowed Manager Ramsey to send on Hunter as substitute, enabling Moore to take over an attacking role, an unusual one for him.

England were soon in front. After eight minutes, Eastham slipped a short free-kick along the left wing to Wilson, who, after racing down the wing, centred hard and low for Baker to run the ball into the net. This encouraging start was the tonic England needed and they went further ahead in the fifty-eighth minute through Hunt. Bobby Charltom, receiving from Cohen, flicked the ball on to Moore who passed back to Cohen. Moore raced into the penalty-area to collect the return pass and centred towards the far post where Hunt drove the ball into the net.
  

Source Notes

TheFA.com
BDFutbol.com
Original newspaper reports
Rothman's Yearbooks
Mike Payne's England: The Complete Post-War Record (Breedon Books Publishing Company, Derby, U.K., 1993)
Norman Giller, Football Author
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CG