defer the trip home

i'm happy but not to the extent of being ecstatic. i was watching the england-trinidad & tobago match last nite and exchanging text messages with a football-mad colleague. we were both criticising the way the english forwards (who?? what forwards??) were misfiring and the midfield, though having most of the play, were not dictating the game. the back 4 were the saving grace & without their rock-solid display of grit, the game might not have been scoreless at that stage. my friend even suggested that sven start booking their flights home. however, crouch & gerrard's late double strike probably postponed the inevitable - consignment to the heap of underperforming discards. hold on to those tickets, sven.

i'm not a true-blue england fan. but after having spent some of the my best years living amongst the queen's subjects, surviving on a diet of shepherd's pie, fish & chips, low-cal coke & scandal-exposing tabloids, i have to admit to feeling some affinity to the football team. after all, i was brought up on a staple of star soccer (that's what the highlight program of the old division 1 was called in the days of black & white tv) & shoot! magazine, & at one stage of my juvenile life, posters of alan ball & charlie george were paid homage with religious fervour. yeah, i was an arsenal fan even before thierry henry was born.

i commiserate with the english team, in that they do not have in their current rank a (fit) marksman that will strike fear in their opponents. someone in the mould of alan shearer, ian wright or gary lineker would lend invaluable support to rooney, set the field alight & get the bookies all excited again. is it time for theo walcott to get a game? ah well, if they do get thru to the last 8 or 4, good for them but that's as far as they deserved to progress. otherwise, it's back to the drawing board for steve mcclaren.

like i said, i'm happy but not ecstatic.