Post by Chris on Jul 8, 2006 22:16:22 GMT
Pretty much sums up England.
wc2006.telegraph.co.uk/Document.aspx?id=ECC06EAE-799E-4F83-808F-2DBAB4923756
Even on the second day after England's departure from Germany, the odour of their hypocrisy lingered. Outside the newsagents' at Heidelberg railway station, the English papers American students were carefully picking their way around contained the players' excuses. Sven-Goran Eriksson was on the wrong end of a sneaky swipe or two, of course - parents who spoil their children often are, and I never feel they deserve a great deal of sympathy - but most of the hue and cry was directed at Cristiano Ronaldo for his supposed part in the dismissal of his Manchester United colleague (for the time being) Wayne Rooney.
Steven Gerrard, a candidate for the captain's role vacated by David Beckham, led the pack. ''I think that sums him up as a person,'' he said. ''I saw what Ronaldo did [he seemed to urge the referee to punish Rooney for his part in a tangle with Ricardo Carvalho] and if it was one of my team-mates I'd be absolutely disgusted with him. I saw Ronaldo going over and giving the card gesture and he's bang out of order.''
Quite. As was Gerrard's close friend and clubmate Jamie Carragher when, after the referee in the famous Champions League final of 2005 had given Liverpool the penalty that was to prove crucial in their overcoming of Milan, he frantically tried to persuade the official to send off an Italian.
Carragher, reminded of the incident some months later, introduced me to the funny side of it: "I got the wrong man!'' Every time he watched it on video, he winced. "The foul had been by Rino Gattuso and there I was pointing at Alessandro Nesta, screaming at the ref to send him off.'' But Carragher denied he had done anything wrong in principle. ''No, no, no --- you try to get every advantage possible. It's not cheating.'' Doubtless Gerrard, in his forthcoming autobiography, will explain the moral difference between attempting to get a player from the same club sent off, even when your duty is to your country and (for that moment) your country alone, and endeavouring to do it to any fellow professional. Doubtless, too, he will give a further airing to the increasingly fatuous excuse that England suffer in major competitions because they are so ''honest'' by comparison with the wily foreigners.
True, Rooney did display a commendable attitude in seeking to come out of his challenge with Carvalho with the ball (and I am tempted to believe he did not intend to hurt the defender). But listen to this guff from John Terry: "Any other team, they go down and the referee gives a foul. But Wayne stayed on his feet...that's the honesty we show.''
The honesty Terry showed when, having committed an aerial foul on Tiago earlier in the match, he spent a couple of minutes on the ground in apparent agony before rising to gape in histrionic astonishment at the yellow card being brandished by a referee less gullible than the Chelsea defender might have imagined. Next up for the righteous-indignation brothers was Joe Cole. "We're going to have to stoop to their level to beat them,'' he said. Whose level? ''These teams. They do it all the time.'' It was up to Fifa to ensure fair play, Cole added. Such commendable sentiments from the man who had infuriated the Swedes with dives that saw at least one yellow-carded.
Either these footballers have brains like sieves - or they think we have. I suppose we cannot wholly blame them, for they are constantly indulged, pandered to and under-disciplined to a degree that must have Brian Clough spinning in his grave. Eriksson, after nearly six years in the job the great Clough craved, walked away last weekend without the slightest genuflection towards his key error in treating English players like the Italians to whom he had become accustomed in club football.
''Don't kill Rooney,'' he pleaded. Of course we're not going to kill him. We just want to reverse the process by which a potential genius is being ruined. Think of history's great players and these names would be on any list: Di Stefano, Pele, Beckenbauer, Cruyff, Platini, Maradona. Not one was a nutter on the field. Not one would swear and swipe at opponents, team-mates, referees and linesmen alike. No, emphatically not Maradona - not after he had learned the lesson of his dismissal in the World Cup of 1982. You can throw in the Englishmen Moore and Charlton; the same applies. Those who have fallen short include Paul Gascoigne and Eric Cantona. No one could quite tame them. And for that reason they are not on the list.
Yet over and over we hear that it would be sacrilege to tame Rooney, to take out that bit of devil. ''Wayne won't get any blame from me because I love him and he's done so much for this team,'' says Gerrard, echoing so many of the worthless words of praise that float around the vacuum Team England has become. If Rooney is suspended, he is no use to anybody. It is as simple as that.
In keeping with the excuse culture, however, I shall refuse to admit I was beaten fair and square by Paul Wilson of The Observer and ascribe the loss of a £1,000 bet to ignorance, when seven years ago I forecast England would be world champions by 2006, that they would appoint a coach who did not understand their psyche as would, say, Peter Taylor: an expensive mistake. I shall say I was fooled by the club performances of Gerrard, Frank Lampard and so on into believing they would learn how to subjugate their abilities to a cause.
I shall ask how I was supposed to know a piece of breathtakingly unethical journalism would cause Eriksson to be stood down and (for all the dignity he may still exude) become disillusioned with our society, weakened at the stage of his stewardship when he needed to be strongest. Yes, to an extent I blame the media for Eriksson's loss of steam - even if the FA should have had enough guts to ignore the fake sheikh's claims -and I can also promise you our press's reputation did frighten off Luiz Felipe Scolari, whom many football writers would have preferred to Steve McClaren as Eriksson's successor. Instead of providing answers, large sections of our media are part of the problem.
I shall also blame the flabbiness of our society for the fact that, over the course of England's involvement in the tournament, only Owen Hargreaves could show a semblance of the verve and courage displayed in Munich last Wednesday night by Cristiano Ronaldo; for all his tendency to cheat, he put most of England's sad bunch to shame. And, if all that fails, I shall take one last leaf out of England's book and blame the hot weather.
Steven Gerrard, a candidate for the captain's role vacated by David Beckham, led the pack. ''I think that sums him up as a person,'' he said. ''I saw what Ronaldo did [he seemed to urge the referee to punish Rooney for his part in a tangle with Ricardo Carvalho] and if it was one of my team-mates I'd be absolutely disgusted with him. I saw Ronaldo going over and giving the card gesture and he's bang out of order.''
Quite. As was Gerrard's close friend and clubmate Jamie Carragher when, after the referee in the famous Champions League final of 2005 had given Liverpool the penalty that was to prove crucial in their overcoming of Milan, he frantically tried to persuade the official to send off an Italian.
Carragher, reminded of the incident some months later, introduced me to the funny side of it: "I got the wrong man!'' Every time he watched it on video, he winced. "The foul had been by Rino Gattuso and there I was pointing at Alessandro Nesta, screaming at the ref to send him off.'' But Carragher denied he had done anything wrong in principle. ''No, no, no --- you try to get every advantage possible. It's not cheating.'' Doubtless Gerrard, in his forthcoming autobiography, will explain the moral difference between attempting to get a player from the same club sent off, even when your duty is to your country and (for that moment) your country alone, and endeavouring to do it to any fellow professional. Doubtless, too, he will give a further airing to the increasingly fatuous excuse that England suffer in major competitions because they are so ''honest'' by comparison with the wily foreigners.
True, Rooney did display a commendable attitude in seeking to come out of his challenge with Carvalho with the ball (and I am tempted to believe he did not intend to hurt the defender). But listen to this guff from John Terry: "Any other team, they go down and the referee gives a foul. But Wayne stayed on his feet...that's the honesty we show.''
The honesty Terry showed when, having committed an aerial foul on Tiago earlier in the match, he spent a couple of minutes on the ground in apparent agony before rising to gape in histrionic astonishment at the yellow card being brandished by a referee less gullible than the Chelsea defender might have imagined. Next up for the righteous-indignation brothers was Joe Cole. "We're going to have to stoop to their level to beat them,'' he said. Whose level? ''These teams. They do it all the time.'' It was up to Fifa to ensure fair play, Cole added. Such commendable sentiments from the man who had infuriated the Swedes with dives that saw at least one yellow-carded.
Either these footballers have brains like sieves - or they think we have. I suppose we cannot wholly blame them, for they are constantly indulged, pandered to and under-disciplined to a degree that must have Brian Clough spinning in his grave. Eriksson, after nearly six years in the job the great Clough craved, walked away last weekend without the slightest genuflection towards his key error in treating English players like the Italians to whom he had become accustomed in club football.
''Don't kill Rooney,'' he pleaded. Of course we're not going to kill him. We just want to reverse the process by which a potential genius is being ruined. Think of history's great players and these names would be on any list: Di Stefano, Pele, Beckenbauer, Cruyff, Platini, Maradona. Not one was a nutter on the field. Not one would swear and swipe at opponents, team-mates, referees and linesmen alike. No, emphatically not Maradona - not after he had learned the lesson of his dismissal in the World Cup of 1982. You can throw in the Englishmen Moore and Charlton; the same applies. Those who have fallen short include Paul Gascoigne and Eric Cantona. No one could quite tame them. And for that reason they are not on the list.
Yet over and over we hear that it would be sacrilege to tame Rooney, to take out that bit of devil. ''Wayne won't get any blame from me because I love him and he's done so much for this team,'' says Gerrard, echoing so many of the worthless words of praise that float around the vacuum Team England has become. If Rooney is suspended, he is no use to anybody. It is as simple as that.
In keeping with the excuse culture, however, I shall refuse to admit I was beaten fair and square by Paul Wilson of The Observer and ascribe the loss of a £1,000 bet to ignorance, when seven years ago I forecast England would be world champions by 2006, that they would appoint a coach who did not understand their psyche as would, say, Peter Taylor: an expensive mistake. I shall say I was fooled by the club performances of Gerrard, Frank Lampard and so on into believing they would learn how to subjugate their abilities to a cause.
I shall ask how I was supposed to know a piece of breathtakingly unethical journalism would cause Eriksson to be stood down and (for all the dignity he may still exude) become disillusioned with our society, weakened at the stage of his stewardship when he needed to be strongest. Yes, to an extent I blame the media for Eriksson's loss of steam - even if the FA should have had enough guts to ignore the fake sheikh's claims -and I can also promise you our press's reputation did frighten off Luiz Felipe Scolari, whom many football writers would have preferred to Steve McClaren as Eriksson's successor. Instead of providing answers, large sections of our media are part of the problem.
I shall also blame the flabbiness of our society for the fact that, over the course of England's involvement in the tournament, only Owen Hargreaves could show a semblance of the verve and courage displayed in Munich last Wednesday night by Cristiano Ronaldo; for all his tendency to cheat, he put most of England's sad bunch to shame. And, if all that fails, I shall take one last leaf out of England's book and blame the hot weather.
wc2006.telegraph.co.uk/Document.aspx?id=ECC06EAE-799E-4F83-808F-2DBAB4923756
