Vive Le France!

Oh dear, my adopted future homeland (France) gave my current one a bit of a hiding last night. I had tried to veer away from footie in the last few weeks as the season had taken its toll on me and I was a bit shagged out. But last night was too much to bear. For the neutrals and the non-footie fans it must have been compelling theatre as wave after wave of French attack pummelled the England defence. I sat and watched with some mates and we all thought the second half performance, whilst brave and stoic, was also cheating the fans. Why do we feel the best policy is defending at all costs? We are as good as these teams but we get a goal up (well done SuperFrank) and against these so called better teams (Portugal 2000, Argentina 2002, Brazil 2002 and France 2004) we just seem to capitulate. You cannot in any game , be it Rugby, Cricket or whatever show these teams too much respect because they’ll see the fear and then hammer you. Perhaps its our daft sense of fair play but my feeling is its more to do with a lack of belief.

The problem then comes down to one man – Fuckwit II, the return of the Fuckwit clan. Yep, Fuckwit Ranierii has gone, but we still have some around and Sven is a fully paid up member of the Fuckwit Clan. Unlike the rest of the nation, including the sycophantic press and broadcast media I think Sven is a twat. Sorry, don’t mean to offend…a fucking twat! How he had the sheer bollocks to come out smiling after that game and say we played well and didn’t deserve to lose is beyond me. We allowed ourselves to be hammered for 45 minutes, we came out and started like a team that knew it couldn’t hold on to the slender lead. What I want is a coach who can inspire and motivate the players, and make them believe they’re all fucking Pele or Maradona (the drug free one!), and Sven is too cool, too dispassionate and too calm for me. I want passion, I want tears, I want tea cups thrown at half time, I want the players to get the “hair dryer” treatment, or get a cuddle or whatever it takes to life THEM mentally.

I want Mike Bassett England manager (as portrayed by the ever excellent Ricky Tomlinson). Failing that bring back the wideboy cockney barra boy geezer that is El Tel Venables. There is no way he would have allowed the team to cave in against the French, who were undoubtedly good, but not unbeatable. They won because they never stopped believing, even after getting a late equaliser My belief is that at that level, whatever the sport, the technical difference in capability and skill is minimal, but what counts…what makes winners is in the mind. Its mental attitude and we lacked a lot of that last night. A quote that I really like that I use to try and help me perform better is this

“Whether you think you can, or whether you think you can’t, you’re probably right” (Henry Ford..a long time ago)

Later, Grocerjack