So England didn’t quite get off to the start that an expecting nation demanded. Capello’s team where cruising along quite happily from a fourth-minute Steven Gerrard goal, but a dreadful mistake by West Ham keeper Robert Green saw the USA earn a point that on the balance of play they probably didn’t quite deserve.
We Scots on the whole are a forgiving people, but we sure like to revel in the misery of glorious English sporting failures. And this one was special, as the irony of yet another goalkeeping mistake that cost England two points is surely not lost on the Tartan Army, who have had to put up with years of hilarious thigh-slapping dismissal of Scottish goaltenders.
Robert Greene, David “Calamity” James, Paul Robinson, Scott Carson, Peter Bonetti, Peter Shilton and David Seaman have all made costly mistakes that lost England important games.
Let’s all laugh at England.
Despite our appalling qualification record and tournament performances, Scottish goalkeeping standards have been raised considerably in recent times, with Hearts keeper Craig Gordon becoming a record transfer (for a goalkeeper) and Alan McGregor of Rangers on the verge of making his way to Portugese side Benfica. Frank Haffey can rest easy, safe in the knowledge that things have gotten better, while the plight of the English goalkeeper has taken a turn for the worse.
And while the English press tends to over-hype, it’s just as quick to condemn. Poor Fabio Capello. One poor result after a fairly convincing tenure in charge of the national side in which he turned around the lets-all-be-chums-and-bring-the-missus politics of the McLaren era to a more disciplined and cohesive unit. Not a bad achievement considering he’s working with pretty much the same squad that did so badly in Germany four years ago.
But here’s the deal: in much the same way that I get sick of hearing Kenneth Wolstenholme telling me there’s some people on the pitch, I get sicker of reading endless Scottish complaints about pro-English media bias in newspapers, editorials and blogs.
There’s no denying that the English football diaspora is obsessed with 1966, but then why shouldn’t they be? As Winston Churchill said, history is written by the victors. And while I hate the arrogance and constant nostalgic look back as much as the rest of you, imagine what might have happened in 1978 if Alan Rough wasn’t as far off his line as he was when Rep unleashed his fierce shot from 30-yards out and Rough, the Partick Thistle regular managed to tip it over the bar. Scotland would have gone through having got the goal margin they need to progress. And picture if you will, that McLeod made good on his promise to win the World Cup, and that it was Scotland that beat Argentina on that afternoon in June 1978.
Let’s all laugh at England.
Gary Lineker may have needed only 22 seconds to mention 1966 the other day, but you can bet the farm on the fact that Archie McPherson, Arthur Montford, Chick Young and the rest of the pundits that have graced our screens and print media over the years would not have needed much longer to bring up our hypthetical World Cup victory in 1978 at any given opportunity.
And in the same way I still get a massive tingle down the spine whenever I see Hewitt scoring for Aberdeen in ’83, I’d love to see the winning goals, the images of the team captain (Darren Fletcher’s grandson, possibly) lifting the trophy, the triumphant return of the team at Prestwick, the open top parade down Princess Street at least once every week. I might even devote an entire section on the site to it.
To win a World Cup is no easy thing, and to see your team join the relatively short list of countries to hold the trophy aloft (only 7 in 19 tournaments) is quite an achievement – something to be rightly proud of.
Let’s all laugh at England.
It’s trite, not to mention hypocritical and monumentally petty for us to continually bash the English whenever they celebrate their success. If the 1966 saga is like a record on endless-play, I’m pretty sure I know what track features on the B-side.
And dear fellow Scottish football fans, there’s no point getting into arguments about this with England fans. It’s an argument you can not win. For every one of our show reels of the collapsed Wembley goalposts of 1977, for every one of Jim Baxter’s keepy-ups in 1967, for every one of the 1928 Wembley Wizards, the English have 1966.
Let’s all laugh at England.
Every time we laugh at Shilton failing to outjump the midget that is Maradona in 1986, they have 1966. For every one of Stuart Pearce’s, Chris Waddle’s, Paul Ince’s, David Batty’s, Frank Lampard’s, Steven Gerrard’s and Jamie Carragher’s penalty misses in World Cup’s 1990, 1998 and 2006 respectively, they have 1966 to restore the natural football order on the island of Britain.
Let’s all laugh at England.
For every Battle of Bannockburn, there’s a Battle of Neville’s Cross.
Let’s all laugh at England?
Well, we could, but actually, let’s not. Our game is on its knees, our clubs are in financial straights, our national side has not qualified for a major tournament since 1998 and our top-flight league is the most one-sided “competition” there’s ever been. And as we’re not actually there (as neatly pointed out by the rebuttal to the recent Anyone But England campaign: SNP, Scotland’s Not Playing) perhaps we’d be better off just keeping quiet.
Or alternatively, we could use England’s ’66 win to motivate ourselves to better our national team, after all if Slovenia can qualify for the last 16 (they are smaller than Scotland)?
But no, we prefer to sit on the sidelines and laugh at our nearest and dearest’s failures.
Scotland will never amount to anything in the football world. Chips, pies, fags, drink and a stinking attitude is what we`re good at. The mentality is totally off the mark for life, never mid sport. Of course we have `individuals` but thats not enough.
Youngsters are more interested in `bucky` and acting hard than anything else.
From the grassroots up, its a struggle. The only reason England are better is they have 10 times the choice. They`re picking from the same ilk though.