United We Stand

I love Scotland.  I have made many visits there over the years on holiday and on business and it is always a pleasure.  It is quite a big place and accounts for 32% of the land area of the United Kingdom.  I have never been much further north than Inverness and I have never been to any of the islands.  My first visit was as a 10 year old when I was still at St George's school and we had a school trip for four days.  We spent most of our time around Edinburgh and visited the castle — of course — saw the Scottish Crown Jewels and shivered in the dungeons.  In later years I have holidayed on the west coast and worked in distilleries, creameries, chemical plants, and pharmaceutical plants.  For most of my life I have lived in Sussex and sometimes the people I visited in Scotland thought I was just another bloody southerner coming to tell them what to do and to gloat over the superiority of life in southern England.  Once I had re-assured them that this was not the case and that [a] I was a northern Englander, [b] Scotland was a much better place to live than south-east England because it was so much less crowded, [c] the people were generally friendlier and [d] I liked going there.  So it was with much relief that I celebrated Scotland voting "No!" in the referendum.  

It was clear from my own experience that there are some in Scotland who suffer from a mild persecution complex when it comes to relationships with England.  This has been exploited by Alex Salmond as he fought for an independent Scotland.  It is a difficult case to make and there was a widespread belief around the world that Scotland was going mad.  The United Kingdom is probably the most successful union of a group of countries anywhere in the world, with a single currency, a stable government and generally considerable prosperity.  It has survived for 307 years since the act of union but for 411 years if we date from the first coming together when James VI of Scotland was invited to England to take the throne made vacant by the death of Elizabeth I.  He became James I of England and after one hundred years of tooing and froing and a civil war the nations came together in the Act of Union in the reign of Queen Anne in 1707.

The arguments against Scottish independence are considerable and it was important that the Scottish Nationalists set out exactly how it was going to work.  They never did this.  Alex Salmond regarded everything as being a plot against Scotland by the English.  He claimed much exaggerated oil reserves, never properly addressed the currency question — as an independent nation he could not use the £ sterling — never told us what he would do with the border, how he would finance defence, how he would keep the big banks [with all their jobs] in Scotland, etc etc.  And above all this Scotland was being controlled by rich, southern public school educated Tories.  Yes, this last does happen but it is an argument that could be made by all in the north of England, as well.  But the Labour Party was lead by John Smith [a Scotsman] and then by Tony Blair [ a Scotsman] who became prime minister for ten years and then by Gordon Brown [a Scotsman], so the southern Tory argument is a bit weak.  Add to that the fact that some 57 Scottish MPs in parliament in London vote on matters that affect only England while similar matters are decided for Scotland by the Scottish parliament.     

The independence argument has gone on for years but during the intense phase before the referendum it has been the Yes camp that has been most active. One thing that has certainly been achieved during this referendum campaign has been a resurgence in public interest in politics.  Not since 1951 has there been such a turnout to vote in any election.  At 84% overall no one can question the validity of the vote — 45% Yes and 55% No is a better result than anyone expected.  It has to be said, however, that there have been some ugly demonstrations of thuggish nationalism with threats made against potential No voters.  Even death threats!  Alex Salmond gave a vote in the referendum to 16 and 17 year olds  — not for reasons of democracy but because he thought they would give a massive vote in favour of independence — and in that he was correct.  But listening to some of the discussions from the Yes camp I came to believe that they had lost all connection with reality.  There was a universal belief that if they were independent they could have free education, free health care, no prescription charges, no Trident bases and an endless supply of money from oil.

In the last week or so, the break-up of the UK looked like a serious possibility with serious implications for the other 92% of the electorate that were never consulted — including a million or so Scots men and women living in England.  It was absurd.  Potentially, the break-up could have been decided by just 8% of the UK population including children and temporary residents from Poland, Lithuania, etc while ignoring  those Scots living south of the border.  Yet, no-one in Scotland seemed ready to question the why Scotland, alone should answer a question that affected the whole of the UK.  A key figure in strengthening the case for unity has been Gordon Brown, who on the eve of the poll made a magnificent rousing speech in Glasgow encouraging Scotland to vote for the most successful union in history.  More devolution has been promised and to a tight timetable but David Cameron has linked this to tackling matters of English devolution and the West Lothian Question.

Nevertheless, in spite of everything, I am very glad they voted "No!"

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Watch What you Are Breathing

Doping in Sports.  It is a never ending subject for discussion and it will remain so as long as we have armies of people involved in the anti-doping industry.  I was interested to read recently that a number of retired bike riders were suggesting that Lance Armstrong should be reinstated as a seven times winner of the Tour de France, in spite of his shock/horror drug use.  I must admit that I take the same view.  He won those races and everyone knows that to complete just one day of the Tour is hard enough, let alone go further and ride 2,300 miles in three weeks on flat roads, on cobble stones and up and down the mountains and be first back into Paris.  I doubt if Lance Armstrong did anything that was not being done by half the peloton — at least.  I know that, he knows that and I should think everyone involved in cycling knows that.  Some of the ex-racers who suggested his reinstatement probably themselves dabbled with illegal substances as well.  However, no matter how much we admire Lance Armstrong's abilities as a racer, I doubt if the powers that be will allow him back into the fold.  He is after all, now the arch-fiend.

However, again, my primary reason for bursting into print today is the news from the world anti-doping authority that they have added the gases argon and xenon to the list of banned substances because, they tell us, these gases could have a performance enhancing effect similar to EPO.  Breathing in these gases mixed with oxygen could encourage the body to produce more red blood cells and thus increase the blood's oxygen carrying capacity and boost athletic performance.  There is evidence, they tell us that certain athletes have been doing this — particularly in Russia.  Is this really true?  Does it really improve performance?  

The big problem for WADA is that they have no means of testing for these gases and, I suspect, it will be a long time before they do.  In the atmosphere there are a number of inert gases — like argon and xenon — and they react chemically with almost nothing and it is this which will make devising a test very difficult.  Added to which the gases are present in the atmosphere everywhere on Earth.  One or two people have pointed out that putting athletes in chambers that mimic conditions at high altitude to do the same thing — increase res blood cells, is probably at least as effective and if you ban gases, you should ban the high altitude chambers.  That is, of course, outside the remit of WADA.  Perhaps if WADA did not exist these bits of international nonsense could be avoided.

How long before they ban krypton and its derivitive kryptonite?  That will get them worrying!

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Bad Day At The Office For Manchester United

I have been very quiet for a long time.  I have been very much under the weather and although I have carried on my day-to-day existence, everything has been done much more slowly.  However, I had to write something about the disastrous season so far for Manchester United.  Louis van Gaal was appointed some months ago to replace David Moyes and he was going to be the wundermanager who would set everything right at Old Trafford.  David Moyes got lots of stick during his term as manager and was blamed for everything that went wrong.  So Ryan Giggs operated as interim manager until the end of last season.  Louis van Gaal has explained why he is such a wondrous manager and it all sounded good until he actually arrived and started doing the job.  So far he has been in charge for three matches and he has lost two and drawn one.  But tonight's loss was something special.  This was one for the record books.

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Manchester United played MK Dons in Round 2 of the League Cup and they were trounced — there is no other word for it.  Here is a team that cost countless millions and has an astronomical wage bill and they never looked like beating the Dons.  In fact it was the 72nd minute before MU mounted any sort of challenge on the MK Dons goal — and by then they were 3 goals down the pan.  This display was pathetic beyond words.  Today MU signed Angel de Maria for a Premier League record fee of £59.7 million.  I hope the scouts have convinced themselves that he can play football.  It is apparent that MU already have some exceedingly expensive players who are clueless.  I have watched them a good number of times in the last year and there are some players who are beyond useless.  The defence is riddled with holes — how else could a Div One side knock in four goals — and the MU strikers — if such exist — never seemed to look like being a serious attacking force.  Van Gall is going to have to sign whole legions of de Marias if he is to turn this side into something serious.  This side of MK Dons has only existed for 10 years, is run on a shoe-string  — like most Div One and Div Two sides — was put together for less than £500,000 and has a wage bill of next to nothing.  Some of the kids playing for the Dons tonight were not far off getting nothing at all for their efforts.  But if they have any sense they will be in with the manager tomorrow negotiating new contracts.  There were 26,000 spectators in the ground tonight to watch the destruction — much the biggest gate in MK Don history.

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This was one of — if not the — worst defeats in Manchester United history.  Will they make top four in the league this season?  On this showing they will struggle to stay out of the bottom three.  No doubt van Gaal will give his players a bollocking on the bus home and tomorrow at the training ground but all concerned will be unable to avoid the ridicule from Manchester City and many another football club down to Accrington Stanley at the bottom of Div Two.

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Caving In

It is now less than a year to the next General Election and the main political parties are already manoeuvring to present the parties in the best possible lights come poling day..  Fair enough, you may say but presentation is all about spin these days.  David Cameron wants to win the next election outright for the Tories — I suspect there will be much reduced Lib-Dem members to lend their support — and to do this he has thought it a good time to have a government re-shuffle.  In general, the only people who think re-shuffles either important or a good thing are those in the Westminster village. Half the cabinet are unknown and obscure to most of the public  so mixing them up a bit does not lead to much reaction out on the streets.  This latest re-shuffle by Cameron has gone further than most people expected and I think Cameron will come to regret his actions.  It is a re-shuffle based on surface appearances rather than substance.  There are, I think, only 39 women MPs in the Tory Party, yet 25 of them are, strangely, now suited to ministerial office.  Most of them are young, look pretty, are almost totally lacking in experience, but will look good on TV..  

Some changes were sensible and inevitable.  Ken Clark has said for some time that he was going to retire and will not stand at the next election. So he will have 10 months on the back benches.  William Hague has had enough of politics and will also stand down at the election.  He has been an experienced hand on the tiller but, I suspect he has found time spent in endless meetings that achieve nothing is a waste of his time, A problem that must be especially true with the European Union, where no meeting can ever decide anything more momentous than the date of the next meeting.  Additionally, in government, there must be whole armies of middle-aged men who never will be missed but they did their jobs.  Now they are to be replaced by telegenic bimbos who are even more obscure than the people they replace.  Some of them will be good at their jobs but when the prime objective is to put in place somebody who will look good on TV, the trivialization of politics is complete.  How can we have confidence in a government that is little more than a branding and marketing exercise.

But of all the changes in this sorry spin, the worst by far is the sacking of Michael Gove as Education Secretary.  Within minutes, the teaching unions were gloating and branding this as a great victory for the unions — and it is.  Here was a man determined to set off down the road to reform education, re-establish standards of learning and get our kids educated, able to perform as well as the children in the best schools in Europe and the Far East.  Of course, he got up the backs of the teaching unions — organisations that are less than valueless when it comes to educational standards.  It is pure Sir Humphrey.  Keep the unions happy and the kids under-stressed, while we educate our children privately!  Certainly it is OK in cabinet stuffed with Old Etonians.  Sacking Michael Gove on the advice of Cameron's electoral spin doctor is bad, bad, bad.  He was the most radical Education Secretary since WWII, and has tried his best to improve standards in schools, while being opposed totally by the unions, the beans and sandals Lefties, the parliamentary opposition and the Guardianistas of Britain.  A motley crew that I would not trust to train the dog.

Next year I have to decide who to vote for in the General Election.  Now there is no-one 

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Record Breaking at Trent Bridge

Today is the day of the football World Cup Final.  Yesterday in the match to decide the bronze medal, Holland beat Brazil 3 - 0.  Those last two games have been soul destroying for the nation of Brazil.  Secure in the knowledge of their expertise in this game they were confident of their abilities and would win the World Cup on home territory.  This left them oblivious to their team's failings when they were less than impressive in some of the qualifying games and were absolutely atrocious when they were defeated 7 - 1 by Germany.  They were little better against Holland and spent a lot of time diving about the field trying to engineer penalties and free-kicks.  Above all, they suffered from.complacency and were prone to bouts of unconnected ramblings around the field.  Most of their players play in Europe and hardly ever play together — but they were still atrocious.  The Brazilians are not used to such disastrous performances and the fans were in tears.  . 

On the other hand, we have come to expect our footballers to be useless, overpaid, arrogant, failing prima-donas led by donkeys and they, ever anxious not to be found wanting, oblige.  We can take it on the chin, in preparation for the next disaster.  In recent times we have got quite good at many sports — except football — but this has not been our best year.  We had a fabulous time at the most successful Olympics in history and we won the Tour de France for the second time in 2 years but after that it was all downhill.  The rugby team is getting better and they may do OK at the World Cup — but it is over ten years since we won it.

And then there is the cricket team.  We have beaten the Aussies several times — and that is the main thing.  We went off to Australia last winter, full of confidence, odds-on favourites to give the Aussies another thrashing.  In the event, we were in trouble from day one and ended suffering a 5 - 0 humiliation.  A return to normalcy, said the Aussies.  We were beginning to feel confident about the cricketers but they came back well-beaten and needing to sort out what was wrong.  They lost the three match series in England against Sri Lanka — giving the visitors their first ever series win in England.  Pretty bad that.  Now we are playing the Indians and that was not going too well either in the first test at Trent Bridge — Nottingham.  The Indians compiled 457 runs in their first innings and then England laboured to 352 for 9 at the end of the third day. 

The last batsman had come in when the score was 298, so the last pair had already added 54 runs.  Nevertheless, things were not looking good with England still more than 100 runs short of the Indian total.  On day four Joe Root came out with England's No.11 batsman James Anderson to see if they could add a few more before they had to start getting the Indians out again.

But then we had some magic and the record books were shattered.  James Anderson played the innings of his life.  He stayed there for 230 minutes, scored 81 runs and when he was out England were on 496, 39 runs ahead of the Indians.  Root, NO 154, and Anderson had put on 198 rune for the tenth wicket — a record in all test cricket.  In the last test against Sri Lanka, Anderson batted in the second innings for 81 minutes without scoring trying to get England a draw.  He was out on the next to last ball of the match.  He had tried so hard to save England and he felt that he had failed everyone.  It would be churlish to suggest that Anderson was only put in this position by the failings of higher order batsmen but, nevertheless, he was in tears as he walked off. Today was going to be different.  This was the first time that Anderson had ever exceeded 50 in an innings in test cricket. Yet in making these runs he played some strokes which Geoff Boycott said he would have been proud of making himself. He posted the highest score ever by an English No.11 batsman, the longest ever innings by a No.11 batsman in all tests [230 minutes and almost one hour longer than the previous record].  Interestingly, the previous record for a tenth wicket partnership was also set at Trent Bridge — in 2013, when Philip Hughes and Ashtong Agar scored 163 for Australia against England.  Has this wicket got some peculiar properties that make it very suitable for No 11 batsman?

On what is still a flat lifeless pitch, this morning India have reached 211 for the loss of 6 wickets.  If England can get these last four batsmen out quickly, they may yet win this match and that would be a real triumph.  More likely is a draw.

But I hope that the Germans thrash Argentina!

Good Luck lads.

Later :

The Cricket ended as a tame draw but Germany did beat Argentina, if only by the one goal.

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An Ambassador Retires

Many years ago, I had a very close friend in university whose mother lived in a beautiful dormi-bungalow in Cheltenham.  I went there many times to stay.  For all the times that I visited there, the family car was a 1957 Morris Oxford.  The Morris Oxford had been the mainstay of the mid-size family car made by Morris before they became part of Austin-Morris and BMC and finally British Leyland.  The car was hardly revolutionary in design but it was always a reliable workhorse.  The distinctive feature of the 1958 model was the sculpted bonnet. It had leather upholstery, a bench front seat and a column gear changer.  Like all such gear changes, the linkages had lots of slack and finding gears was sometimes a hit and miss affair.  But you got used to it and all-in-all for its time it was a good car

Then they started to build the Morris Oxford in India, called it the Ambassador and the car carried on being made virtually unchanged for more than 50 years.  The total production must have run into millions.  The Ambassadors were extensively used as taxis but also for carrying families and all their possessions the length and breadth of India.  Even today there are still 30,000 Ambassador taxis in Calcutta alone.  It had its idiosyncrasies but the Indians got over these with a smile and a few oily or damp rags.  But now it has been announced that production of the Ambassador will cease in the next few months.  It is, after all, an ancient design but it fundamental reliability and robust strength have endeared in to many an Indian family.  Over the years they have carried prime ministers and presidents and carried on when many a lesser vehicle failed completely in the Indian heat and monsoon weather.  It will be a long time before the last one retires but what a glorious history for any motor car. .

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Brazil In Trouble

Today I was firming up on my designs for my master bedroom.  Hopefully I can agree all the details with the suppliers by Thursday and they can go ahead.  

The Tour de France having left behind Le Cote de Blubberhouses and other Peaks in Yorkshire, is now back on Le Continent and will remain there until the finale in Paris.  But whatever happens in this extraordinary sporting spectacle, nothing will compare with the events during the three days in England.  We gave them everything.  Most people in the South of England know little of Yorkshire; the French even less.  And in two days of glorious sunshine Yorkshire showed itself to the world and embraced everything of the Tour de France.  The crowds were absolutely massive — estimated about 2.5 million on each of the two days in Yorkshire and the helicopter showed the fantastic scenery, the glorious buildings, the towns and villages, the literary heritage, and the industrial buildings.  The organisers were gob-smacked by the response and the vast crowds.  Some of the riders reported goose-bumps as they endured the noise and squeezed their way through the walls of people.  And the racing was not bad either.  I was able to realise just how good these bike riders are as athletes as they surged up the cobbled main street of Howarth — Bronte country — a street which I know from direct experience is seriously steep.  They had a genuine sprint finish on the day, which unfortunately left Mark Cavendish badly injured lying on the floor, before he was taken to hospital and eliminated from the race. On day 2 the finish was on a half-a-mile of very steep road in Sheffield — Jenkin Road — which provided a terrific struggle among hill climbers and the top men to keep their places — it was like the Pyrenees. Could we have imagined such a scene?  On day 3 there was a stage form Cambridge across Essex and some beautiful English villages and more vast crowds before another big sprint finish on The Mall in London in the pouring rain.  We had to give them some rain so that they would know that they had been in England in summer.  All in all, it was epic and there is no doubt that the organisers will want to come back here again.  Congrats to all concerned in putting on this spectacle in England.

Meanwhile today in Brazil, Germany inflicted a staggering defeat on the home team in the World Cup semi-final  They won 7 - 1.  The Brazilians supporters are in shock and many were in tears.  But their team were abysmal in a way that only teams like England can aspire to.  They were atrocious and at half-time when they were already five goals down, they were booed off the field.  The booing was not quite so bad at the end because a lot of supporters had left or were sitting on the ground and crying.  It is difficult now not to make Germany favourites for this World Cup.

Good Luck Netherlands, tomorrow.

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A Big Wage Or A Hunger To Win

The weather in England this weekend is hardly inspiring.  It's cold and wet — more like February or March than late June.  But it is the weekend of Glastonbury and it wouldn't be the same without the wind and rain and sea of mud.  It probably captures the nation's mood as well.  Andy Murray is doing OK at Wimbledon — so far he has not lost a set.  But the cricket team succumbed to Sri Lanka on Tuesday giving the visitors their first ever series win in England.  England fought hard for a draw and after a long time at the wicket, James Anderson, the No 11 batsman got out on the next to last ball of the day.  He was distraught but at least they tried.  Potential spectators thought nothing of England's chances on that final day as they started off at 57 for 5..  Nobody turned up to watch  The pictures on TV displayed acres and acres of empty seats.  We do like to watch winners and who can blame us for that.  On Thursday, the English Football team slipped back into England; ignored, unloved, almost unnoticed, with some players showing signs of distress but most appearing almost indifferent to what had happened in Brazil..  Many will never go to the World Cup ever again so now they can get back to basics, concentrate on playing in the Premier League, collecting their ridiculous salaries, buying their mansions and holiday homes and driving around in their Range Rovers and Ferraris — all courtesy of the punters who thought they were world class footballers..   

I was quite surprised when watching this World Cup just how many of the world's top class players ply their trade in the Premier League.  Is this beneficial to English players or does it limit opportunities for new young English players to climb into the top division?  I don't know — it can be argued both ways,  But if players like Christiano Ronaldo and Luis Suarez can work their ways up from modest jobs, poor backgrounds and less than glorious academic achievements to become two of the best players in the world, there should be no reasons why a lad from Essex or Lancashire should not be able to find their way to the top.  Perhaps the vast salaries, in many cases out of all proportion to the skills and abilities on offer, do create an attitude of complacency and relaxed contentment that takes away the hunger needed to perform at the highest levels.  Look at the European teams that have gone out at the group stage.  England, Spain, Italy, Portugal — all top football playing nations, knocked out in many cases by the superior skills and hunger of teams from mainly small Latin American countries — Chile, Columbia, Costa Rica, Uruguay — and a few other American countries with rather larger populations — Brazil, Argentina, Mexico and USA.  Apart from Germany — who must be one of the favourites to win the World Cup — the only survivors from Europe are France, Belgium, Greece, Switzerland and Holland.  I was glad to see the Jurgen Klinsmann managed USA team go through. Football is a minority sport in America but the team played good open football and even made Germany work hard for their win

But what can be done to make England into a world beating team?  On the face of it, very little.  The FA is drowning in a sea of complacency.  After such a disastrous performance, they should be telling the world that they are committed to a root and branch investigation into what went wrong and coming up with the right answers so that by 2018 they have a team capable of challenging for the win. We do not want the FA and pundits telling us of the positives.  There can be few positives when the team fails to win a single game and after 280 minutes of football has only succeeded in scoring one goal against teams like Costa Rica and Uruguay.  Like BIll Shankly said, "Winning is not most important thing, it's the only thing!"

Hear!   Hear!! to that.

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They Think It's All Over

In two hours, England will play their last match in this Brazil World Cup.  Whether they win or lose is of no consequence.  The abject display in their first two matches was enough to sink them.  But Costa Rica will want to win and win well to show that they are not just the also-rans that they were labelled before the tournament began.  And in addition there will be players wanting to display their abilities in order to angle for a job in England where they can earn fabulous wages.  Many of them can already speak English.

We, Joe Public, for the most part only see our footballers on the field of play.  They have very little interaction with the fans either at home or on the international stage.  The newspapers have been trying to suggest why England do so badly and wondering how, in spite of the disaster in Brazil, they can carry on regardless.  In my last post, I mentioned the success in Munich in 2001 and many are now wondering whether Sven Goran Eriksson was not a considerably better manager than Roy Hodgson.  But the newspaper men have been with the England team in Brazil — and in the days and matches leading up to the finals — and they are revealing an organisation — the FA — completely out of touch with all reality.  The players have been escorted everywhere by minders and told what they can and cannot say and to whom.  They have been surrounded by marketing men, presentation gurus, kit and promotional marketing men and spin doctors galore.  A vast army was gathered together by the FA to ensure no player showed anything other than a zombi-like adherence to instructions.  They were told when and where to appear and in what dress.  They should say nothing that had not been previously authorized.  Even walking along the beach they appeared out of place.  The FA took along a huge entourage of suits and blazers to manage this World Cup; they chartered an aeroplane; they constructed an immense media centre — even bigger than that of the host nation; a training centre that was selected for being photogenic rather than the best place to train.  Players were almost an adjunct to the marekting of the FA.  What did all this fannying about do to help performance?   I don't know how good or bad these players are but, for sure they are not as bad as they have appeared.  I have been critical of Steven Gerrard but Martin Samuel in the Daily Mail has said of him that a footballing colossus has been regularly reduced to mediocrity when on international duty.  He has had countless great games playing for Liverpool for some eighteen years but great performances for England have been few and far between..  Why?  Is it that the oppressive effect of the FA apparatchiks has done for him.  Has he and the rest of the team been managed into oblivion?  This will be Gerrard's last World Cup and it was clear at the press conferences that he was distraught  at England's failure.  He is considering his future and deciding if he should carry on.  He will not be in the starting line-up for today's game   But Gerrard should not have an ending like this to his career.  He has been a loyal servant of Liverpool — and England — through thick and thin and it is surely wrong that he should be considering his future while Hodgson and the suits carry on as though nothing had happened.  It seems that Gerrard may be allowed to resign the captaincy and then — as sure as eggs are eggs — he can be made the scapegoat.

Martin Samuel contrasted the control freakery of the England squad with that of team from Chile.  They turned up in Rio, kept contact with their fans and the day before they hammered Spain they had a great party in the hotel for players, officials, friends, family, fans and anyone who wanted to join in.  There was food, music, chat, dancing and at the end a private team meeting.  They were completely relaxed and ready to enjoy themselves in this tournament and now they are qualified for the knock-out stages. But, said Samuel, whatever happened with the FA, England could never be this relaxed.  I like Chile and the Chileans and I wish them well in this tournament.

Also, I wish England well for their final game but when they get back to England there has to be a proper examination of why everything went so badly.

My tips for the final — Germany and the Netherlands — unless they play each other before then..

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Why Are England Football Teams So Bad?

Tomorrow, England play what will be their last game in this 2014 Football World Cup tournament when they meet Costa Rica, their last game in Group D.  Costa Rica have already qualified for the next stage by beating both Italy and Uruguay and based on that form they should beat England to give them a 100% record in Round 1.  However, England being England, I expect they will produce their best performance of the tournament;  I will not put money on them to win but it is just possible that they will.  Their efforts against Uruguay were so abysmal that they cannot but improve on that.  Continuing the Wagner metaphor from my last post, I ask, will they produce the marvellous moments along with the terrible half-hours.  Another Wagner quote I remember is that by the American critic who said that Wagner's music was better than it sounded.and Tchaikovski who sat through hours and hours of The Ring and as the last notes of the final opera died away, he felt he had been let out of prison.  So it is with the England.football team.  On paper they have a team that seems much better than it plays and as the final steps of another inept display fade away, we can get back to reality.  As a friend said to me at the end of last week, "Now that England are definitely knocked out, we can relax and enjoy the football."

I have just been re-reading an article from the Daily Mail in January 2011 when Joe Bernstein wondered if footballers in England were over-paid.  The question is still relevant today.  Too many footballers, said Joe Bernstein, were millionaires driving around in Ferraris when they deserved no better than Reliant Robins.  The Mail article was published to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the abolition of the footballer's maximum wage in 1961.  At that time no player could earn more than £20 per week, which was just above the average wage in the UK.  Now the average pay of a Premier League footballer is about £35,000 per week and the maximum [Wayne Rooney] is £300,000 per week.  The average wage for Joe Public is about £600 per week.  So an average footballer has gone from earning the average wage [about] to earning 54 times the average wage.  Are these players of such awesome brilliance that their pay is justified?  For many years now, the England football teams have failed to perform over and over again and nothing is done.  The players continue getting their fabulous wages and living a life of extreme luxury.  I do not watch Premier League football very much any more because I think that much of it is mediocre in spite of the vast sums handed to the players.  And the pundits in the TV studios seem oblivious to the problem.  Have they become so used to mediocrity that they do not recognize the inferior quality of the play.  

David Beckham was not the greatest footballer in the world but he always made an effort.   In taking free kicks and scoring he was supreme; he set the standard for others to copy.  And he could pass a ball inch perfect.  But he did this by practicing and practicing until he could do it again and again.  Even now Beckham still says how proud he was to play for England and how even more proud he was to be captain.  Apart from goal-keeper Peter Shilton, Beckham is the most capped player in English football history with 115 caps — although this total was equalled by Steven Gerrard in the match against Uruguay last week.

Now Harry Redknapp has thrown another cat among the pigeons by suggesting that during his time at Tottenham he knew of players who did not want to play for England and asked him as club manager to help them avoid this or that game.  This has incensed Gerrard who has demanded that Redknapp names names.  It is not a revelation that will surprise many of us.  Former England manager Graham Taylor has come out in support of Redknapp, saying that players not wanting to play for their country is "not particularly new."  Often Premier League managers help players suffer "injuries" in order to keep them out of international matches when the player was crucial for an upcoming Champions League or Premier League match — games that could make difference of millions of pounds to club income.  And these clubs pay the players's fabulous salaries.  How often it is the player who has wanted to escape international duty and how often it was the manager wanting to keep the player rested and uninjured, we do not know.  Yet more support came from John Harton, former coach of the Welsh team, who said that clubs play a part in footballers not wanting to play for their country.

Premier League football is all about money.  Many players have little or no contact with fans and as long as the money keeps rolling in, why should they bother.  Also, I think many players are enveloped in a cloud of their own delusions.  If there are clubs daft enough to pay them more than £100,000 per week, they must have huge talents and the fans ought to be grateful for being allowed the opportunities to see them play.  But to a lot of football supporters, the England team is the pinnacle.  We want to see them win and win well. 

How many can remember that day in the Olympic Stadium, Munich on 1st September 2001, when England beat Germany by 5 — 1, Michael Owen scored a hat-trick and Sven Goren Erickson was the manager?   The nation — with some justification — could not believe it.  The Germans couldn't believe it either.  It was said the BBC, "a stunning performance as England came from behind to thrash the Germans.  Previously,in their whole history, Germany had only lost one home game in qualifying for the World Cup.  They were torn apart by England playing slick football with a clinical edge up front."  That team included Beckham as captain and, in addition to Owen, they had Neville, Ferdinand, Campbell, Cole, Barmby, Scholes, Gerrard and Heskey with Seaman in goal.  That was the same Steven Gerrard who captained England in the debacle in Brazil.  Can he explain where the difference lies?  Is it just that the team of 2001 really was much better than the team of 2014?

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