The Daily Telegraph - Features
Watching England play in the Euros is always a prelude to doubt and fear
Once more unto the breach, dear football fans. My menfolk – let’s call them Bud, Peroni and (it’s got to be) Gordon’s – are crouching silently in front of the TV as if at prayer. Which they are, with God being a better bet than Gareth Southgate.
The boys do not rate the England manager. He is “Rishi Starmer”, a mediocrity who can’t lead. His consensual teambuilding approach is scorned. “The world’s highest-paid social worker. Abysmal!” Even before the match starts, Gareth has blotted his copybook by leaving out someone called Cole Palmer and playing a “workhorse” instead.
As the designated Snack Handmaiden, I am keeping a safe distance while observing the curious rituals surrounding the first England game of the Euros. We’re playing Serbia. Cue lots of grim muttering about the Yugoslav civil war. Gordon’s says it’s a good job we can’t understand what the Serbian fans are shouting at our black players. (We are the least racist country in Europe, despite what the diversity mob may say.)
The Serbian players look mean and lean, in a famished wolf way. All their brutal-sounding names end in ić – Mitrović , Vlahović, and the adulterous one, “Sevenyearic.” Bellingham, such a nice boy, scores with a brilliant header, but England doing well, I learn, is always a prelude to doubt and fear. “Watching England is never a pleasure,” Gordon’s says to Bud.
The team are holding on to their one-goal lead and seem to have given up playing. Meanwhile, Gary Lineker is really letting the side down. His predecessor, Des Lynam, would always wear a jacket and tie, as befits a funeral or a Royal event (an England fixture is a bit of both). But Lineker is sporting some kind of putrid green leisurewear, which looks disrespectful and impertinent. At half time, he changes into a linen shirt which is marginally better.
I am staggered to read later that both items of clothing appear on Next’s website modelled by… Gary Lineker who has his own fashion range with the retailer. Surely not on the BBC? Bring back Des, I say. Oh, and please play Cole Palmer against Denmark tomorrow, to shut up Bud, Peroni and Gordon’s.