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The build-up to England entering a football tournament is characterised by a slow abandonment of my own internal cynical logic for this sort of dumb, puppylike wonder and optimism for the future. One month before a European Championship, I am like: "I'm not even going to hope about it. France have the squad. They are going to win." Ask me a couple of days before and I will take you by the shoulders and scream, "GARY CAHILL IS FRANZ BECKENBAUER 2.0! PLAY HIM IN THE SWEEPER BEHIND STONES AND SMALLING AND WE WILL BE IMPENETRABLE! PLAY WAZZA AS A PIVOT!" I almost always end up buying a £65 England away kit. I sing the national anthem – a song I loathe for a country I mostly hate – with gusto at the start of games. I am crawling up a mountain of expectation, pushing the boulder of hope with my nose. Eleven men in perfect white home kits consistently cause me to entirely abandon my senses.What is it about England that causes me to hope? And what is it about the relentless cycle of that hope followed so inevitably by full-scale crushing despair that causes me to fall for the same trick, again and again and again? Why do I always think England are going to be good? Why do I always expect them to magic up some sort of imperceptible, transcendent, perfect squad harmony, become immaculately drilled defensively, front line interchanging and moving like the gleaming cogs in an intricate old device? Why do I ever expect anything more than underwhelming 4-4-2 and a second round exit? Why have I been so consistently fooled by England squads, by Joe Cole, by Rio Ferdinand, by Yung Michael Owen through Bad Michael Owen, from Wayne Rooney 2004–2006 through Wayne Rooney 2007–2016? Why do I spend hours in the pub debating the merits of Andy Carroll? Why did I ever try to mentally crack the "Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard playing in the same midfield" conundrum, i.e. mathematics' final un-solveable puzzle? Why am I trapped in a Groundhog Day where England give me a false, fleeting flutter of hope, then snatch it away again with 70 straight minutes of Dele Alli passing it to no one?READ ON VICE SPORTS: Tragedy, Comedy, Steve Mcclaren: England Crash Out of Euro 2016
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