Back at you: Our riposte foresees a very different outcome

The 1-1 draw with France in the opening game, a serious result and performance if ever there was one, has done nothing to restore England’s credibility on the  international stage. Prior to the match with Ukraine, France coach Laurent Blanc was still having fun at England’s expense.

‘We can’t repeat the first 30 minutes against England,’ he said. ‘If we had played against a really good side it would have been over.’ Frankly, the laughter continues to echo from that fourth German goal in Bloemfontein.

The Swedes, meanwhile, continue to look back to the 1992 edition of this tournament, recalling the match and headline that seemed to crystallise decades of English disappointment: Swedes 2 Turnips 1. No matter that the last result between the teams was an English victory in what proved to be Fabio Capello’s final game. Sweden now sees every meeting between the nations as inspiring another pratfall from the folk who claim to have bequeathed the game to the world.

Maybe it is these very English pretensions that are the root of such merriment. John Cleese mined his post-Monty Python career from the simple realisation that the taller and more pompous the man, the funnier his loss of decorum and dignity.

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