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da blaze casino： 1. Just when you think you’re out..They pull you back in. – Driving reflectively away from Wembley (if you can drive reflectively) listening to Alan Green masterfully squeeze in another shot at David Beckham whilst debating a completely unrelated point about Montenegrin weather cycles, the overwhelming feeling of “here we go again” stuck prominently in our collective minds. Oh England. England England England. What are we going to do with you ey? What had seemed like a semi-exciting semi-revival a few months ago – with impressive victories against Bulgaria and most notably Spanish conquerors Switzerland – transpired to be merely a blip in the otherwise steady dribble of mediocrity that is the England national football team.
2. The Vanishing – It had all started fairly ominously for team England, with little or no traffic hold ups anywhere up the A406. And as sure as night follows day, thunder follows lightening and Danielle Lloyd follows the Tottenham team bus, the third successive low Wembley attendance followed this North Circular exodus. A healthy sounding Old Trafford like 73,000 witnessed this moribund spectacle and whilst that doesn’t sound too bad out of context, the fact that the most heavily supported country in world football, a country who can muster forces up to 100,000 to travel mostly ticketless to other parts of the globe biennially, and who have sold out their national stadium’s 90,000 capacity allocation for games against such titans as Andorra and Macedonia, can leave over 16,000 seats empty for three consecutive games, only two of which surpassed the attendance for the Johnstone’s Paint Trophy Final, and even then only barely, is a sad one. Stock in England is down, way down after South Africa, and nights like this aren’t doing much to help.
3. Embarrassing Bodies – After entering the fray to what sounded like the theme from Big Brother, the teams lined up for the national anthems with Montenegro facing away from the Royal box, cameras et all and towards their own fans. This was presumably some stirringly patriotic gesture but could just as easily have been seen as a deep embarrassment at being seen standing anywhere near the England team. And who would blame them really?
4. Back, and to the left. Back, and to the left – Once Steven Gerrard had done playing quarter back for 10 minutes and realized he probably would have to do some running in this one, England settled in to a hypnotically repetitive rhythm which consisted mostly of Gareth Barry losing the ball, Gerrard winning it back again before hitting a hopeful long ball out to Johnson and/or Young, who were then expected to do practically everything penetrative on their own whilst Wayne Rooney complained about something somewhere on the pitch 20 yards behind where he should’ve been. Peter Crouch missed his customary easy header because he’s rubbish at heading the ball despite being the size of a tree, and the half ended to the now mandatory chorus of boos and crocodile shoe steps as the Club Wembley brigade hurried back inside to see if their complimentary cheese platters had arrived yet.
5. Always look on the…. – In the second half things perked up a bit and were it not for the alarmingly continuous poor form of Wayne Rooney combined with the impressive panther like reflexes of the Montenegrin keeper, England could have been relatively comfortable by the end. For all the miserableness, we did at least create chances, unlike say, against Algeria, where we were so inept a bird could sit quite happily on the opposition netting without so much as a hint of disturbance. And hey, we held the group leaders. Result!
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6. Degrees of Kevin’s Bacon – After 20 minutes of realizing the tactic of having someone tall up front wasn’t working, Fabio decided to switch things up by replacing him with a bruising if ineffectual center forward to foul people then complain about it but offer little else, presumably forgetting – as everyone else had – that Wayne Rooney was already on the pitch.
7. In out, in out shake it all about – I’m not entirely sure what Shaun Wright Phillips keeps doing to earn his caps, but his introduction did at least inspire a brief injection of urgency, and the opportunity for the Montenegrin right back to add some variety to his game by fouling someone else for a while. Why he needed to come on on the left however, whilst the left footed Adam Johnson was busying himself fervently on the right, unpredictably cutting inside as often as he could, I’ve no idea. But then I’ve no idea how Barry stayed on the pitch either. Or how we got to this point in the first place. Can someone wake me up when it’s over please?
8. Hooof, there it is! – And so as the game petered out uninspiringly, England resorted to that good old tried and tested method of kicking it long up to the big man, forgetting of course that the big man had already been taken off. It was depressing. More so than the rather sad and predictable booing that now accompanies any sub standard performance or unlikable Chelsea player (or Chelsea player, as they’re more commonly known) these days. This is all we have isn’t it? This is us? Despite all the money, all the fame, all the world wide adulation and million pound contracts this is still all we have in our locker when confronted with stubborn opposition. Whack it up field innit John. Hooof! Just like Spain did when confronted with line of upon line of heavy-handed Dutch opposition for 115 minutes. Oh wait no, that’s not what happened is it?
9. Who are ya?. – Credit must of course go to Montenegro. They came with a game plan and carried it out. They’re not top of the group for nothing. They were a bit cynical at times but then they have 56 million fewer people than us. Bettering us would’ve been shatteringly embarrassing. They held their shape and almost nicked it at the end with a terrifying dipping volley. Their fans also did their very best to rival our own Geordies in shirtless shouting, and made an impressive amount of noise for their numbers. Especially since most of them probably had to get back pretty early to make sure all the shops were open.
10. On Englands green and pleasant pitch – On a final, rather wistful and unrelated note, I think it’s about time we replaced our national anthem. Unbeknownst to many in fact, it isn’t even our national anthem. It’s the anthem of Britain, and one Scotland, Ireland and Wales can (but obviously choose not to) sing. Instead they have their own individual separate nation anthems to add to this unneeded Great British one. We are the only ones who don’t. And since we’ve started singing Jerusalem in this months Commonwealth games (a far superior song in both words and melody, if equally packed with bizarre religious rhetoric) it’s about time we stop this cringe worthy paean to monarchy, empire and slavery and adopt something a little more resonant and relevant in modern England. May I suggest It’s Chico Time perhaps?
You can follow Oscar on Twitter here; http://twitter.com/oscarpyejeary Where you can help him debate the relative qualities of Jaffa Cakes, Eggs and Crack. Which is better?