Oh. My. God. Where am I? Who am I? Why am I?

Let's answer the first question, because no-one really cares about the other two - I'm finally at home, which is an absolute shithole because a) I was unable to move and think for two and a half days after the mammoth drinking session caused by England massacring Argentina 1-0, and then b) as soon as I managed to de-mank meself, I had to leave town on work-related arse for another two days.

Meanwhile, the World Cup has been going absolutely mentalist - France have choked harder than a fluffer in a porn film set in a zoo, Italy have stumbled, Ireland have come good, Japan and South Korea are showing how utterly worthy they are to be trusted with such a tournament, and England - well, if you don't know by now, then you shouldn't really be reading this. So piss off.

Day 8:

THE LOST WEEKEND

June 11th 2002

Anyway. It's 11am on a Friday morn in Olde London Towne, and your old mate Nishlord is standing outside a locked-up pub, rubbing his cakey little hands with glee at the prospect of England v Argentina. Yep, I know I said I was shitting bricks about this game, but by the morning of the game, I was ready to die for this shiznit. If England lost, or even drew, there was a very good chance that we'd be out, and my entire World Cup experience would be over for another four years - so I was gonna milk the fucker. And so, it seemed, was everyone else. Six million other people had scabbed the day off work, two billion pounds worth of person-hours were being pissed up the wall, and Oxford Street was dead. Normally, you need a cattle prod to get the tourists out of the way.

By the time the doors opened, I managed to bag the best seat in the pub - directly in front of one o' them massive projector tellies with easy(ish) access to the bogs and the bar. For extra luck, I had invited a few mates from Leytonstone who I saw the last England-Argentina game with. (actually, seeing as we lost that game, I've realised what a twat I was, but never mind). Sadly, the pub packed out so quickly, some of them had to stand outside in the rain until half time. After the debacle of the Sweden game, this was more like it.

Now, one thing you need to know about Argentina. It doesn't matter what your politics are - they are so fucking easy to hate. If you're Liberal, you can point to their penchant for military juntas who were well into their torture and kidnapping and doomed us to another decade of the Tories in power. If you're Conservative, you can scowl at them for putting the innocent Falklanders under the sway of their jackboots (yeah, maybe it was 20 years ago, but we still bang on about Germany. Jesus, just as well the Normans and Vikings aren't in the World Cup) If you're somewhere in the middle, you can get all riled like all good Englishmen at the fact that not only are they better than us at football, they still have to cheat - and even worse, they get away with it more often than not. After this is all over, I fully expect to see Vince McMahon standing in the tunnel with a stack of contracts for Argentina - they're perfect heels.

The rambling bollocks above is my explanation for the torrent of swearing that is about to follow.

The national anthems start. I love national anthems before the game, as the players all look like borstal kids who have to be in a musical, and the commentators get all arsey about the way the other team's supporters are jeering and whistling. Everyone in the Argentinian squad, with the exception of Veron, sport hairstyles that make them look like Hanson - if Hanson were so hard up they were having to make porn films to make the rent, which for all I know, they probably are.

I love long hair on footballers, as it offers the opportunity to sing the greatest song in the footy fan's repatoire - yes, even better than "Posh Spice Takes It Up The Arse" or "You Can Stick Your Fucking Trumpet Up Your Arse". It's the one you sing to the opening bars of 'Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep' by Middle Of The Road that goes...

Where's yer caravan? WHERE'S YER CARAVAN?

Where's yer caravan? WHERE'S YER CARAVAN?

And then the real stick kicks in. Argentina, you see, are suffering from an economic downturn that any right-minded person feels nothing but sorrow for. Oh, apart from the times when you play them at footy. Then it's perfectly acceptible to stick the boot in. Some Argentinian fans are throwing confetti in the air as is their wont. "THAT'S RIGHT, YER BASTARDS! CHUCK YER FOOKIN' CURRENCY AWAY, IT'S USELESS!" says a rather pent-up baldie as my - er, I mean, his - pint slops fore and aft as he makes wanker signs.

(Wanker signs, eh? Aren't they genius? I remember going to Forest games and there would be one bloke who did nothing all game but lean over the fence and make the most enormous wanker signs at some of the best players in the country. As time went on, he matured and brough his three year-old son to the matches. And he taught him how to give wanker signs. As the two of them bonded through the wonder of masturbatory gestures at men who earned more in a week than either of them ever would in a year, I would brush away a tear and, well, piss meself laughing)

The game starts. Gabriel Batistuta acts the cunt with Sol Campbell right from the off, and then leaps at Ashley Cole as if he was a CIA agent leaping onto a live grenade thrown by Osama bin Laden at George Bush - and then, as poor Ash is trying to shove his brain back into his ear, Bastardtuta looks at the camera and makes a diving gesture. The pub erupts.

"FUCK OFF, you CHEATING CHIP PAN-HEADED CUUUUNNNTTTTTT!"

And then, it gets better. He tries to catch David Beckham in the snotbox with his arm not once but twice, falls on his arse, and then starts whining for a free kick.

"AAAaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHGGGGGGGGHHHHHH! Get a FOOKING ECONOMY AND WAS YOUR 'AIR, YOU BASTARRRRDDDD!"

This is great. This is what it's all about. I look out the window at the pub across the road. There's about 20 blokes in suits who obviously couldn't get out of work quick enough and have to stand in the rain, jumping up so they can see. All making wanker signs at the telly. I was so proud to be English.

Back to the game, and fuck my eyes - England are playing decent. Even better than that, they're having a dog back at the Argentinians. There are two key moments in the game at the beginning - when the telly screen flashes up the fact that England have committed more fouls than Argentina, and when Beckham elbows one of them in his face and there's all blood everywhere.

And then, the penno. And my God, if Michael Owen didn't do 'em again. Was it a dive? Maybe. Do I give a monkey's wank whether it was a deserved penno? Hm, let me think about that. No. Oh shit, and here comes Beckham to take it. And get this - their goalie shows him where he should put it. What a cunt. And then, Diego Simeone, who got Beckham sent off 4 years ago, comes over to take the piss.

And it didn't even matter. He cracked it a fucker. 1-0. The entire country makes a noise like they've just caught their pubic hair in the blender attachment of a Kenwood Chef, and surprising had an orgasm because of it.

"NNNNNNGGGGAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHKKKKK!"

Half time. Fucking hell. We are beating the favourites. Our evil nemesis. On a dodgy penno. Obviously, Argentina are gonna get their shit together and fight back. And who knows, they might even play some football while they're at it. My dear friend Shitter and I discuss this grave threat, whilst draining the first of many 4-pint jugs of Fosters and eating hashish. Already it's taking effect...

"You know what? If we beat these twats I shall die happy, but you know what?"

"Eh? I'm cunted, me"

"If they come back and they're winning 3-1 with 10 minutes to go - and I'm not a violent man, Shitter, you know that. I'm a lover, not a fighter, yeah?"

"Yeah, you're a right soft twat, you"

"Yeah, I know. But if that was that, right...3-1...and I was Sven...I'd say "well, lads, we're fucked now, there's no point playing Nigeria...so go out there and give these bastards a right good shoeing""

"Yeah, that'd be fucking wicked"

"Don't bother playing the ball...just gie 'em a good kick in the cobblers and stamp on their heads! And yeah, you'll get sent off..."

"Yeah. Fucking refs..."

"Sent off, yeah...but you KEEP KICKING AND NUTTING until all that's left is David Seaman, and you just stand in the middle of the pitch with a machete and shout "COME ON! BASTARDS! HAVE SOME! Because I'm ENGLISH!""

"They'd be fucking heroes, Nish. If they did that, I'd walk to Heathrow just so I could applaud them when they got off the plane. Let's have some more ale, innit?"

Second half. Argentina start to realise that they're losing, and try to come back. But Christ on a bike - look at England! They're making them look like a right shower of bastards. As the ball is stroked around by England, the ultimate insult starts up.

"Ole!"

That's the noise you make when you've got the ball, you're winning, and you know you've got the other fuckers beat. You hardly ever hear it this early in a game. "Ole! Ollleeeeeee! OOOOOLLLLLEEEEEE!"

"HA HA HA! LOOK AT FUCKING BEPPE!"

Juan Sebastian Veron, who looks a bit like a character on miserable Cockney soap opera Eastenders and every right-thinking Englishman hates because he plays for Man United, pops up on the screen, sat on the bench after being subbed, and he's thinking what I'm thinking; "This is ENGLAND? Those fuckers who always choke against us? Shitting hell fire"

England, at one point, string seventeen passes together. Normally, they can't do that when they're training with a load of plastic cones. And then, at the end of it, Terry Sheringham pulls off an absolutely gorgeous volley. If it hadn't have been aimed at the keeper and if it had gone in, I would have turned into a puddle and would be absorbed into a beer towel by now. By the end of it, Argentina are pushing forward, but they can't hit a cow's arse with a banjo. Very nervy ending, but all the better for it. England prove that they can actually defend, the final whistle blows, and everyone rubs up against each other like yappy little dogs on heat.

After the game, whilst Paul Scholes is being interviewed, two unnamed Argentinians storm past in a huff. "Bastardo!" they charitably state, like the true gentlemen they are. Paul Scholes, like any true Englishman would, ignores them. Then, thinks 'fuck it', turns round, and gives them the wanker sign. How beautiful.

I can;t remember much after that, apart from little fragments. I remember shaking someone's hand in the toilets while we were both having a piss. I remember a spontaneous football match between two opposite pubs in the middle of one of the busiest streets in London, while people on scooters and in vans zipped by waving England flags. I remember nearly getting into a fight with some fat cunt in an England shirt who claimed that I was a ponce and wasn't even in the pub, when in actual fact I was first one in. I remember meeting a mate in Soho and helping her workmates empty the free bar their company had laid on. I remember marching up Oxford Street with my Walkman on full, bellowing the words to Wonderful World, Beautiful People by Jimmy Cliff. I remember falling asleep on the Night Bus and going right back into London, but not giving a shit about it because I could get the morning papers. I remember getting a text message from three different mates that said they had been crying. I remember wanting to spread all the papers on the floor and roll about naked in them. I remember feeling like absolute dog shit for the next two days and not being able to type. I remember thinking what a great day it was.

And now, England are about seven hours away from their final group game - which they could still fuck up, remember - and I am about four hours from leaving me flat so I can travel across the country and get there in time for kick-off. Ugh. But tomorrow, I shall be back. This is shaping up to be one of the best World Cups EVER, children - and I shall make up for my absence with the full details of what is about to go down...