Terry Venables started life as England head coach with a win, as David Platt's goal saw England beat European Champions Denmark by 1-0 at Wembley.
Platt scored the only goal of the game when Alan Shearer steered a clever pass into his path and the Sampdoria man fired a first-time left-footer past Peter Schmeichel.
Darren Anderton almost completed the perfect debut but his effort was cleared off the line before David Seaman produced a match-winning save at the other end to deny Brian Laudrup.
The fit-again Shearer had the ball in the back of the net early on but was ruled offside and received some choice words from Manchester United goalkeeper Schmeichel for his troubles.
The next big chance fell to Paul Gascoigne, who played a one-two with the recalled Peter Beardsley to work his way into the box but Schmiechel was quick off his line to smother the chipped effort and Beardsley fired the follow up high and wide.
But on 17 minutes, Venables was able to celebrate the first goal of his tenure as Shearer and Platt combined beautifully for the latter to score his 21st international goal in only 46 appearances.
Gascoigne's second big chance of the half came when he beat the offside trap for a free header but again Schmeichel was equal to the effort and got down well to keep it out.
Blackburn left-back Graeme Le Saux put in a particularly impressive performance on his debut and his marauding run helped set up a chance for fellow debutant Anderton to double the lead.
Le Saux drove at the Danish defence before firing a pass into the feet of Platt, who cushioned the ball neatly into the path of Anderton only for Marc Rieper to clear off the line.
The visitors had their best chance of equalising when Michael Laudrup found brother Brian in the penalty area, but Seaman was quick to react and bat the shot away.
But the goal never came as Venables sealed the first victory of a new England era as his rebuilding began with EURO 96 on home soil on the horizon.
England: 1 David Seaman, 2 Paul Parker, 5 Tony Adams, 6 Gary Pallister 3 Graeme Le Saux, 4 Paul Ince, 8 Paul Gascoigne, 7 David Platt, 11 Darren Anderton, 10, Peter Beardsley, 9 Alan Shearer
Substitutes: 14 David Batty for Gascoigne 67, 16 Matt Le Tissier for Ince 67
Goals: Platt 17
Denmark: 1 Peter Schmeichel, 2 Carsten Dethlefsen, 3 Marc Rieper, 4 John Jensen, 5 Jakob Kjeldberg, 6 Lars Olsen, 7 Henrik Larsen, 8 Kim Vilfort, 9 Ben Christensen, 10 Michael Laudrup, 11 Brian Laudrup
Substitutes: 13 Jes Hogh for Christensen 71, 15 Soren Frederiksen for Vilfort 71
