Should Michael Owen ever give up the night job, then he surely has a career as one of the most stealthy burglars in the world of football.

Quite how he does it, nobody knows, but brace of goals stolen in the cold night air here were full of alertness and hunger and deliberation — and not only did they give England an unlikely win against an Argentina side who had largely outplayed them, they posed the question whether Owen is our Jonny Wilkinson of the round ball.

It is totally beyond belief. Here is this comparatively small man who, at 5ft 8in, was like the pimpernel to the Argentinians last night, stealing in behind their backs to head in, not once but twice, from all of seven yards. They knew he was there, but they couldn’t stop him. Indeed, neither could the other Englishmen who, certainly for the second goal by Owen, tried to get there before him.

It accelerates Owen to 35 goals from 75 internationals. He is closing unerringly on the only three Englishmen ahead of him in the record books — Jimmy Greaves on 44 goals, Gary Lineker on 48 and Sir Bobby Charlton on 49. It will come, after last night you have to believe that; around Owen, anything that he desires will come.

For such is his breathtaking killer instinct that he had pulled from the fire a match that was lost, in a contest in which it is not too disparaging to suggest that he was barely engaged for the other 88 minutes. Wayne Rooney had done his running, Owen was a ghostly figure not seen or heard, and there lies the ultimate danger when Owen is around.

Just months ago, it seemed that nobody but Newcastle United wanted him. Liverpool, Manchester United, Arsenal and even Chelsea were invited to bring him home from Madrid, but none did so. And those four clubs, particularly Chelsea if last night’s other goal thief, Hernan Crespo, has really fallen foul of Jose Mourinho, could do with this finishing device, this apparently extrasensory ability that Owen possesses to sniff out a goal, and to walk off the pitch the hero we almost didn’ t see.

There are people asking now if this is like 1966, when England, just months before the only World Cup triumph we have enjoyed in our history, found new players, Martin Peters and Geoff Hurst, in the run-in to the tournament. Those with shorter memories think of rugby union, think of 2003 when England won the World Cup in Sydney, and again who would have expected it, who dared to predict it until the tour of New Zealand and Australia the year before? But there I go, snatching at omens the way Owen plucks goals out of thin air.

We know that he has this remarkable mindset; modern fans would call it cool. We have seen him score relentlessly for Real Madrid, even when Madrid’s coaches did not select him to start matches in La Liga. He bided his time and he struck as a substitute. And last night he might claim he was biding his time again, chosen from the start but not really implicated, not moving with the deception of an outstanding striker, not showing for the ball, not really a part of the effort.

All of that gets erased by the ability — ability that clearly evades the eyes of watchers such as myself — that Owen has inside his head. There was, however, somebody who knew. Standing outside the stadium before the kick-off, an Argentina fan had said: “We are so scared of one man, Michael Owen. He’s the killer of us, our defence has some problems, and I’m afraid of him.”

Without question, he turned a night of defeat into triumph. England, in all but stamina and tenacity, were out of this contest, and then up pops Owen, so sharp, so singular, so breathtaking.

Heaven help the victim if Owen became a sniper: give him just two bullets, and watch him take the life out of the victim, with barely a raised eyebrow.

“If we had lost, we would have still believed we had a chance of going to the World Cup next summer and having a good tournament,” a jubilant Owen said aftewards. “Just because we have won, it doesn’t mean we are going to win in Germany but it does give the confidence a lift.”

More of this, and Sven- Göran Eriksson might even be minded to move his symbiotic relationship with his skipper David Beckham, and trust in Owen. You cannot win without scoring, and aside from Rooney, who was trying so manfully to be all things to England’s attack, nobody but Owen was going to finish the job.

The questions it raises are deep, because men of Arsène Wenger’s capacity, and need, had overlooked Owen’s availability in the summer.

Relentlessly, he closes on those records. He is still a month shy of his 26th birthday, and they say in the game that only when experience gels with the physical ability and the know-how at mid-career do the strikers really find their rhythm. Possibly, Owen could argue otherwise.

Deep inside himself he surely knows that he may never score a better goal than the one he did in 1998 at the World Cup in France against Argentina. He danced that night through the entire back five of the enemy, sheer youth drew him forward, you could even say that it was selfish to play out the fantasy. Yesterday, in the danger zone at a range of seven metres, just a touch of his forehead was twice worth the same end as that boyhood masterpiece.

Newcastle United must be mighty glad that it was their desperation, and their money, that brought Owen home.

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