ENGLAND v GERMANY

England 1 Germany 0 (Shearer, 53)

Oh, jolly good, England beat Germany 1-0. (Only 400 arrests). Shearer celebrated his goal (which I could've scored) in his (only) typically bland style. (Rip your shirt off or something Shearer - for goodness sake!). Thank goodness we stuck with him, eh?? What a (lone) contribution he made to the game!! AT LAST!! After 34 years of waiting and longing to beat the Germans (who have only succeeded in winning one World Cup and 2 European Championships in the meantime - compared to our Tournoi win) we finally succeed (beating possible the worst German team since time immemorial). We've spent the last 34 years reliving the triumph of '66 (jammy as hell and on home soil) with the good old boys, Hurst, Ball and all (all making a handsome living out of this) - now, I suppose we will spend the next 34 (or more) reliving this heady night in Charleroi! Hah! We were terrible; the Germans (even having their worst team since time immemorial) were superior in every department, except for the fact that they froze when presented with open goals, unlike our magnificent captain.

Scathing? Me? Too right I am. I now realise why I cannot be a supporter of the English football team. I cannot stand the "we are better than the whole world at this game" attitude, when we are not - and never will be if we continue to play as we do. I was really hoping for a loss (and a heavy one) against this in-fighting bunch of Germans, because then people might have noticed that we ain't what some (most) make us out to be. I was hoping that we would scrap the "come on then - see if you can beat US" attitude and consider that we are not a force to be reckoned with. At all.

The thugs? I disassociate myself (as 99.999999999% of the population will) from them. As said before, I do not know anybody who is, or who ever could be a soccer hooligan. Lovers of the sport could never tarnish it like that. But we have to ask ourselves "why" or else every English person will continue to be unfairly tagged with "hooligan" stamped across their foreheads. Watching the deported return to England last night, I couldn't help noticing how totally DIM they all were. I'm of the opinion that only really no-brain persons would sink to the depths as these do. They were unfairly treated (and roughly) by the police, they squeal (grinning mostly). WHY DID YOU GO, then?? Why do these morons journey over, without tickets to foreign parts, if not to create havoc and expect to be arrested, treated badly and chucked out of the country? What makes them do it? Blame drink if you like - but the average person would just fall asleep after a whiff of that Belgian brew. Personally I think it's because (a) they have no intelligence to speak of (b) the media fed them what they wanted (we must hate the Germans still, though Lord know why - and they seem to like us!) and (c) because we do not consider ourselves part of Europe. Last night on the news I heard "These fans will not be allowed back into Europe . . . " Then where the hell are they now????????????? Seems to me that there is a lot less water between us and mainland Europe - and yet we are still happier to be embraced by our American buddies, than by our colleagues on our doorstep. I don't get it.

Funny too that it is only males who turn into soccer hooligans! You don't see gangs of "sisters" marching onto peaceful town squares in PMS-provoked rages, do you? Why's this I wonder? We have testosterone too - necessary to give us a spot of libido to brighten up our lives - but obviously not enough to provoke us to want to go and fight with somebody (anybody). Consider; I am sitting here now with the sun beating on my back; I have a slight hangover; my mouse is misbehaving; I cannot get onto the Internet for longer than 2-minute-at-a-time spells; my roast potatoes have burnt. Sure, I am muttering things under my breath - but, come 7.30pm (when the Spanish might once again have made fools of themselves) - should I go out and kick in the fence - or become a little bit tearful?? Give these jerks a few injections of oestrogen and progesterone and they'll be cured! Trust me!!! :)

But it is the notion that we are better than we are which gets to me the most. The Sunday Times in their article they seemingly brush aside the hooligans (nothing to do with us) as merely "taking away a bit of the joy of the win" and "making our chances of holding the 2006 World Cup look extremely bleak now". Well, curse them for this - but ask yourselves why sometimes, huh?

There follows a piece from a webpage which I am not going to give a link for, because of the language used and I don't agree with his attitude. However, at least what he says is more honest than the Times article.

That's all from me. I've said my bit and now I have to don my Spain shirt!

"Anyway, I'm having a fine doss. Last night's opening game between Belgium & Sweden was watched in a huge pub with people from all over the world - and it was interesting to see how everyone behaved.

The Swedes had commandeered the entire front row in front of the telly.

The Belgians hid in the corners. The Danes, Norwegians and Swedes all got beers for each other and drank until they passed out.

The Czechs jumped up and down all night.

The Americams walked in, noticed the enormous screens on every wall blaring out football, stared in horror as if they had blundered into a San Francisco bathhouse, and scurried out again.

And the English? Oh dear. It seems that there are enormous arrogance glands that get activated as soon as we hit foreign airspace. Everywhere you went last night, if there was ever the merest hint of bad vibes, it was from the English. When one of the Danes toppled over from his chair and collapsed on the floor in front of me, I went to help him up with some Czechs. And immediately copped a ****load of abuse from some Scousers for blocking their view of the telly. On the tram, last night, I saw a group of 'Lads' (ie, factory boys with badly gelled and combed-forward hair in nasty market jumpers) standing in the face of this Asian bloke and whistling the theme tune to 'The Great Escape', after they failed to get some Dutch girl who looked as if she had to put up with this **** on a daily basis. It was amazing. Threatening whistling. They had taken all the pubs over and stood in the doorway, singing 'No Surrender To The IRA' and puking up, ripping the p*** out of the prostitutes, and generally getting on everyone's t**s.

And I know what you want to hear. "Why, Nishlord? Why do you and your ilk have to act the **** when you're abroad?" Many reasons, actually - and all of them pretty p***-poor. Firstly, we still have a hangover from the War. Secondly, we truly believe that we're the greatest country in the world and we're above everyone else. Thirdly, we don't consider ourselves part of Europe at all. Fourth, our sh***y licensing laws means that at home, we can't carry on boozing after 11.30. When we go abraod, we try and get p***** as quickly as possible, and then discover that in actual fact the bars are open well into the night, and we get massively ******. Oh, and we're a bunch of petty-minded sh**-thick bigoted ****s. Not the majority of us, of course - there were plenty of other Brits about who were just as p***ed off as everybody else, if not more so - but just enough to make their presence felt.

Teams and things

England: Seaman, G. Neville, P. Neville, Campbell, Keown, Beckham, Scholes (Barmby 72), Shearer, Owen (Gerrard 61), Ince, Wise.
Subs Not Used: Martyn, Wright, Adams, McManaman, Southgate, Barry, Heskey, Fowler, Phillips.
Booked: Beckham.
Goals: Shearer 53.

Germany: Kahn, Babbel, Nowotny, Scholl, Kirsten (Rink 70), Matthaus, Hamann, Jeremies (Bode 78), Ziege, Deisler (Ballack 72), Jancker.
Subs Not Used: Lehmann, Butt, Rehmer, Linke, Haessler, Wosz, Ramelow, Bierhoff.
Booked: Jeremies, Babbel.

Attendance: 30,000. Referee: P Collina (Italy).