Fabio Capello told Wayne Rooney to carry on tackling as England edged towards qualifying for the 2010 World Cup.

The England manager admitted he was delighted with the heart and character of his side as they battled through some anxious moments after Peter Crouch had given them a first-half lead.

Andriy Shevchenko, the Chelsea striker who is on loan at AC Milan, equalised for Ukraine before captain John Terry scored a late winner with a close-range volley to continue England's perfect record in Group Six.

But Capello was anxious to defend Rooney who was involved in a feisty clash when he appeared to play the ball but caught Ukraine's Oleksandr Aliyev with his follow-through which left the Dynamo Kiev midfielder writhing in agony.

"The referee said what happened was nothing," said Capello. "He arrived at the ball and got the ball. It was a normal tackle. We need this in our team. We need strong tackles."

It was a far from convincing performance, however, which left Capello admitting he had suffered some of the most anxious moments of his 13-match reign with England.

He said: "When the referee whistled for full-time I was very happy.

"But I am happy also for John Terry and the team. It was a very tough game.

"We showed patience and I am very happy with the characters of the players, particularly in that second half.

"A lot of players played very well. They played like a group, like a team and this is very important. You can win only if you play as a team. It is not easy to play against Ukraine. Not easy to find space."

The Italian also praised Terry's attitude after a week in which his mother hit the headlines in connection with an alleged shoplifting offence.

The victory leaves England with 15 points from five games and with one foot on the steps of the plane to South Africa for next year's World Cup.

Capello, whose next matches come against Kazakhstan and Andorra in June, added: "Five victories and 15 points is important and I hope in June the players will be fresher than now.

"This period of the season is when the players are not so fresh and there was not much space.

"But I think they shot twice and scored once. We had more attempts at the goal and that is the reason we won."

Ukraine manager Oleksiy Mykhaylychenko believed his side controlled much of the game, even though he conceded some of his players were overwhelmed by playing at Wembley.

He said: "We tried not to let them play their usual game, but we made quite a few mistakes.

"The English team did not have that much threat on our goal but we didn't play as good in attack as in defence. We might have been too excited or it might have been the atmosphere of Wembley.

"We tried to neutralise Rooney and tried to move forward up the left wing where Aliyev was our main attacker."

He also revealed that Shevchenko had always been their secret weapon to hit England in the latter stages.

He said: "Our plan was to keep Shevchenko on the substitutes bench until the English team were exhausted.

"I think England have a great chance to win the group but only half the games have been played so it is too early to say anything definitely."