Brolin, Dahlin, Brolin... Brilliant: Barry Davies followed his "Where were the Germans? But frankly, who cares" of Seoul 1988 with more seminal commentary four years later in Stockholm

England’s failure to beat Sweden in a single competitive match is therefore made more amusing by the fact that in each of those games, almost the entire English nation expected victory as sincerely as Basil Fawlty believes he is running an upmarket establishment.

The contradiction is most explicit in the perception of club and country. Sweden is obsessed with Premier League football, to the extent that Aftonbladet regularly devotes six or seven pages to the English game. ‘Sometimes more than is in your papers,’ says Peter Wennman, their UK correspondent. The national team, by comparison, are game for a laugh. Anxious not to think himself coach to a bunch of clowns, however,  Hodgson insisted the problem was, if anything, too much respect.

‘I’d be surprised if teams aren’t taking England seriously,’ he said. ‘I think it’s more that in previous tournaments, we haven’t been able to live up to some very, very high expectations. I think the reputation of  football in England, the famous names of the Premier League will always mean we are not taken lightly. Swedes spend a lot of time watching our Premier League and get extra motivated to beat an English team. They like it if they can show that these highly paid superstars are not better than their players.’

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