Comments on Obsolete: Why England continue to lose and what needs to change.

As a Scot who was quite happy to see the defeat I ...

2010-07-02T00:47:07.360+01:00

As a Scot who was quite happy to see the defeat I realise that my comments here are about as welcome as a shite in a spacesuit.

Nonetheless, I would like to say that this is actually the best reasoned article I have ever seen from an English football fan about the malaise of the team.

One of the reasons Scottish people are so anti-english football team (and i do think it is anti english-football team, rather than anti-english [independence is another question..this is football]) is basically the media.

Scots tend to laugh at it. There is always the "we have the best players in the world...we should win cos we are best" jingoism.

As you said, more or less, if they said "we have a good team with good players, we have a possibility of reaching the semis and once you get there then who knows?" then that would be a more honest initial assessment and you wouldn't get all the bile and hatred at the other end when they don't win.

As for the goalline decision I think the Germans pointed out that what goes around comes around.

unbelievably the word verification thingy is 'seeger' so here is a relevant pete seeger tune about supporting sides...

http://bit.ly/YjXxz

You should read "Why England Always Lose"...

2010-06-29T17:11:12.340+01:00

You should read "Why England Always Lose", a great book about that melds economics and football.

Basically, it makes a strong argument that England actual over-acheive, International success is based on the the following factors:

1) GDP
2) Population
3) Experience of playing football

The only nation that consistently beats that equation is, of course, Brazil but only on the issue of GDP.

The book also makes it clear that high wages buys success, but that obviously cannot be applied for national team. It bets that Iraq will be the next footy powerhouse.

Now that England has had its arse kicked out of th...

2010-06-29T13:58:14.944+01:00

Now that England has had its arse kicked out of the World Cup by Germany, can we now turn the Nation's attention to an important issue?

Instead of flyng the St George flag, the UK should be flying the White Flag of Surrender in the Prisoners Votes Case.

It would appear that the UK is seeking a facesaver and this is only delaying amending s.3 of RPA 1983.

In my view, it is totally unacceptable that one version of events is stated and accepted at the Council of Europe, and nothing is stated by the UK to the electorate giving the impression that another version of the events is held over here.

Do you think we can now get the position clarified so that we can move on?

All these allusions to the Battle of Britain etc a...

2010-06-28T22:27:37.899+01:00

All these allusions to the Battle of Britain etc are misguided - there were 595 non-British out of 2396 Allied pilots - and not all of the British ones would have been English.