England All Stars - World Cup Germany 2006

Oi! Leave him alone!

Laura — Wed, 21 Jun 2006 22:47:07 +0000

What the fuck is wrong with England fans? Correction! What is wrong with some low-level, scumbag England fans. Leave the boy Hargreaves alone! Don’t boo him! Don’t jeer him! What the fuck is that all about? The man has lifted more silverware than David Beckham has had nannies. Check out his record:

Intercontinental Cup Winners 2001; European Super Cup winner 2001; Bundesliga Champions 2000-01, 2002-03, 2004-05, 2005-06; UEFA Champions League Winner 2000-01; German League Cup Winner 2000-01; German Cup winners 2002-03, 2005-06.

Let’s compare this to Lampard’s:

Football League (Carling) Cup winners 2004-05; FA (Barclaycard) Premiership Champions 2004-05, 2005-06

And what about Gerrard?

Football League (Worthington’s) Cup winners 2000-01, 2002-03; FA Cup winners 2000-01, 2005-06; UEFA Cup winners 2000-01; European Super Cup winner 2001; Football League (Carling) Cup runner’s up 2004-05; UEFA Champions League winner 2004-05; FIFA World Club Championship runner up 2005.

Hargreaves deserves to be in the England squad and many would argue that he would be well placed in the first eleven. He certainly played a good game against Sweden, picking up the ball and distributing well so that Lampard could play his favourite attacking game.

So what if he speaks with a Canadian accent? So what if he lives in Germany? So what if he wears his jumper around his shoulders from time to time? And so what if he’s not a lad, a geezer, a chav, a fella, a bruv ?

To all you twats who booed him at the match and who booed him down my local, pick your fucking neanderthal knuckles from off the floor and get a fucking life. What’s wrong with a bit of culture, a bit of intelligence? Feeling threatened are you?

And just think: who else is going to be able to help Theo with his homework?

No Smoke Without Fire

Laura — Mon, 19 Jun 2006 08:54:28 +0000

It’s been a funny old World Cup so far. England have kept a clean sheet despite fairly average performances, France have yet to turn up, and Brazil seem to have left their mojo in the changing room. Argentina and Portugal have provided us with master classes in World Cup football, while Ghana have left us gasping for more of the same.

But spare a thought for this man, the embattled Togo coach Otto Pfister who, until this morning, didn’t even know whether his team would turn out against the Swiss today. Not only was his skipper sent off in the opener against South Korea, but a long running pay dispute between the players and their national Football Association has made for a rocky couple of days. Refusing to board their flight to Dortmund it took an intervention by FIFA diplomats to persuade the debutants to put in a performance today. Clearly feeling more than a little fucked off by the whole thing he sparked up in front of millions during the first match. Take a deep breath, Otto. It’ll all come out in the wash!

Once more unto the breach, dear friends

Laura — Fri, 16 Jun 2006 06:59:27 +0000

All hail King John, a tower of strength and courage. With woad like fire in his veins and the strength of a thousand men, he stands like a wall between victory and defeat. King John holds us all, like Atlas, on his shoulders. A leader of people, his steely, determined eyes betray nothing but passion for team and country.

Stand proud, England! Cometh the man, cometh the hour!

England V Trinidad and Tobago

Laura — Thu, 15 Jun 2006 06:52:40 +0000

I’ve got a great feeling about this match, despite reports that Trinidad and Tobago play with a twelfth man, a spirit player who guides them through the match. After their performance against Sweden they’re going to be well up for it, but so are the England lads despite the German fans celebrating outside their hotel all night. Who needs sleep in the World Cup when adrenalin alone can take them all the way.

Owen’s sounding more confident claiming he can get the Golden Boot this year. Perhaps that’s a bit optimistic, Michael, but I’d be made up if you did. And Rooney could be gracing us with his post-metatarsal presence, a massive lift to the team and fans alike.

But this match was always going to cause me some stress. The five o’clock kick off is going to mean some creative thinking across the country today in order to get out of work and to the pub on time. Do I go straight to the pub on my scooter ensuring I get there for kick off? That would mean being the only sober person in a pub full of revellers. Do I drop the scooter home and rely on London buses to get me there? Risky. Do I leave the scooter at home altogether and rely on public transport all the way? Riskier still.

Either way, get me to the pub on time. It’s going to be a blinder

Easing into it

Benny — Tue, 13 Jun 2006 22:57:08 +0000

In light of nearly all of first round games being played (with the exception of Group H), England’s result against Paraguay doesn’t actually look so bad. Yes the overall performance wasn’t great, especially as we all looked a little limp by the end, but getting that all important first win is surely the major thing.

If you look at all the games played I think you could say alot of the teams expected to do well seem to be taking it slowly. Brazil looked like they were playing beach football (Brighton not Rio) and teams like Portugal and Holland have done enough in their games to get to the end feeling contented.

Of course some teams have decided to steam right in. The Czechs looked right up for it in their match against USA while Germany stormed to a thumping 4-2 win against Costa Rica.

But with the rest of the group games still to come, some of the big boys will be looking to get more into it and find a lot more penetration, with the English lads in particular showing us how it’s done.

Sure we’ll all be bouncing up and down for joy when they do…

The Morning After

Laura — Sun, 11 Jun 2006 11:00:30 +0000

I write this with a sore head and not a little trepidation in my heart. Yesterday’s match was a weird one. On the one hand we should be ecstatic that we won and that T&T drew with Sweden leaving us in a strong position going forward. On the other hand we didn’t exactly strike the fear of God into the hearts of any future opposition. No one anywhere right now in the whole world is saying anything like “oh fuck, we’re playing England soon”.
And the referee was dodgy as fuck, too. Quite apart from resembling one of those little wooden men out of a subuteo set, he was also quite clearly a tosser of the highest calibre, a fact made abundantly clear merely by looking at his hair. Somewhere in the world there is a brill cream shortage… and it certainly isn’t in Germany.

As I was watching the match, probably shortly after Sven had substituted Downing for Owen, and Hargreaves for Cole, our most creative player on the day, a familiar feeling settled about me. It’s a difficult one to describe, a cocktail of hope and excitement laced with miserable foreboding and a twist of defeatism. Oh, and lets add a dash of hopelessness for good measure.

I shared this feeling with my mates who were biting their fingernails all about me.

“That’s what it feels like to be a Man City fan,” said one of them. “That’s how I feel week in week out.”

And Christ, guys, that’s got to be one hell of a miserable existence!

Great balls of fire

Bjorn — Sat, 10 Jun 2006 17:51:01 +0000

Well at least thats what it felt like in the heat of Frankfurt. It would’nt have been so bad, but we didn’t exactly set the stadium alight with our silky skills. The heat certainly got to the gaffer, we’re always telling him to wear a hat. Those substitutions left me and Benny scratching ourselves with bewilderment and most of the team to be honest. I especially feel sorry for Defoe and Bent, they must have been shaking their heads with disbelief why they didn’t make the squad. Then again at least we can all take a major positive from the game, we can only get better.

Broken Dreams

Laura — Thu, 08 Jun 2006 09:37:44 +0000

Whilst Rooney returns to Baden Baden with a hop, skip and a jump, spare a thoughtÂ for French striker Djibril CissÃ© who has broken his leg just days before the World Cup is due to kick off.Â Talk about shitting in someone’s branflakes!Â He’s got to be the most unlucky bloke around.

I remember that gruesome match he played against Blackburn in 2004 when he broke his tibia and fibula.Â The bottom half of his shin dangled from his leg.Â Being a touch squeamish it was all I could do to keep my beer down!Â Apparantly a similar sort of thing happened this time round.

For the average bloke on the street playing in the World Cup is a fantasy, a schoolboy dream.Â Just imagine how it must feel to get the opportunity to make that dream come true only to have it snatched from you at the eleventh hour.

As the French say… Unlucky!

Who do you you are kidding Mr Lehmann

Bjorn — Wed, 07 Jun 2006 22:43:56 +0000

If you didn’t think Jens Lehmann was a massive twat well you’d be wrong.

For yes he has clearly excelled himself with his current “England have a mental block” rant, 2 days before the Germans get thinks started against Costa Rica.

Jens is clearly remembering the time the boys last suffered a mental block when we could only put 5 past his beloved Germany in their own backyard (and even Heskey scored!!).

Time to rejoice?

Benny — Wed, 07 Jun 2006 21:16:56 +0000

According to this BBC report the boy wonder has won his fitness battle and will be winging his way back to Germany (with the unlucky Defoe on the next Easyjet flight back home).

If this is the case it’ll pose one serious question. With Rooney back who will the gaffer play upfront?

Does he go with 2 recovering from injury players in Rooney and Owen? Will he stick with the little and large Crouch/Owen combination that has looked pretty good in recent matches. Maybe Crouch and Rooney? or he may decide not to play all 3 and stick Walcott up on his own with Hargreaves playing just behind!!!

Whatever the pairing, and providing this report isn’t a pile of horse crap, the whole nation will be breathing a big sign of relief.