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There was actually a nice little article in yesterday's Times that kind of summed this up, 'Dream of glory, expect anguish. We wouldn't have it any other way.' by Simon Barnes. I' link but you have to register to view it. Anyway, since last night's desperate display, we now find ourselves in what I think of as 'England at the World Cup situation 1', wherein we haven't done nearly as well as we (over)confidently thought we would/should and find ourselves towards the end of the group stage in a 'if we win by X points and teamforeign lose by Y points then England will go through' situation. BTW, notice my mad overuse of the word 'situation', it is a classic of the football commentating genre. Usually what happens next is that we and/or teamforeign don't oblige and England is on their way home. I'm thinking of 1998, for example.
If we do, by some miracle, make it through to the knock-out stage, then of course we come to the real classic, 'England at the World Cup situation 2'. This is where at some stage it all comes down to penalties, and dear God help us, we always lose. More often than not to Germany. Or at least it seems like that. To be honest you could pick your tournament for an example of this, but I think Italia '90 was particularly painful, because we'd really started to think we might have a chance.
Of course, I really really hope that it doesn't work out like that. That we demolish Slovenia and every other team that gets between us and the title this time round. I was born a suspiciously 8 and 1/2 months after we won in 1966, so it's entirely possible I owe my existence to Banks, Charlton et al, in a manner of speaking. Positive thinking is a wonderful thing, COME ON ENGLAND, it's just we've been here before, haven't we?
If we do, by some miracle, make it through to the knock-out stage, then of course we come to the real classic, 'England at the World Cup situation 2'. This is where at some stage it all comes down to penalties, and dear God help us, we always lose. More often than not to Germany. Or at least it seems like that. To be honest you could pick your tournament for an example of this, but I think Italia '90 was particularly painful, because we'd really started to think we might have a chance.
Of course, I really really hope that it doesn't work out like that. That we demolish Slovenia and every other team that gets between us and the title this time round. I was born a suspiciously 8 and 1/2 months after we won in 1966, so it's entirely possible I owe my existence to Banks, Charlton et al, in a manner of speaking. Positive thinking is a wonderful thing, COME ON ENGLAND, it's just we've been here before, haven't we?
