Football came home, but England never changes
Tuesday, June 25 — Truce reached in tabloid’s soccer war
A funny thing’s happened here. No, let’s make that a hilarious thing has happened. The tabloids, you see, have gone too far.
The Daily Mirror is the culprit. They’ve trampled on the tulips, told the world about the syphilitic Spaniards and now the paper’s editor, Piers Morgan, has decided to bring out the heavy artillery for the Germans.
Yesterday’s headline: “Achtung. Surrender. For you, Fritz, ze Euro `96 is over. The Mirror declares war on Germany.” The paper featured Stuart Pearce and Paul Gascoigne on the cover, with tin helmets circa 1944 stenciled on their heads.
While we were expecting the jokes about stealing the best sunbeds, queue-jumping and toothbrush mustaches and “Don’t mention the war,” many people have had enough of the Little Englander posturing.
One angry Mirror reader, Any Carmichael, reported both the paper and Morgan to the West Midlands police for inciting racial hatred, an offense under the Public Order act.
“I went to the library and looked at the act and the rubbish they had on the front page is in blatant breach,” said Carmichael.
That’s not all: early motions were tabled in parliament to deplore “the frenzy of jingoistic, notably anti-German nonsense in the tabloid press.”
And the Press Complaints Commission received 67 complaints, the most since The Sun’s coverage on the Hillsborough Stadium disaster in 1989.
“The grubby little men who write this sort of trash should remember that our monarchy are krauts and that our defense minister [Michael Portillo] is a dago,” says the redoubtable Lord Healey.
Morgan, 30, was forced to climb down off his perch and apologize, saying the whole thing was intended as a joke. Today’s paper has a photo of Juergen Klinsmann kneeling beside a Harrod’s hamper under the headline of “Peas in our time.”
The Sun takes the moral high ground.
“[We’ve] maintained a jingoistic approach rather than a xenophobic one,” says editor Stuart Higgins. Huh? The moral high ground in this instance simply means you don’t run it on the front page: “Let’s Blitz Fritz” appears on Page Four, after the topless Page Three models pose under the heading “Fritz out for the lads!”
This is the latest and gravest controversy surrounding the Mirror. Trailing the Sun in circulation, the paper has had a miserable tournament. It decided to publish an apology to Gascoigne on its front page after the Scotland game, then four days later a photographer was caught snapping Gascoigne on a private fishing trip. Gazza demanded the film be returned, but the snapper sped off, almost running over the playmaker’s foot in the process. Now that would have been a story.
The heavies have taken the opposite tack. “It’s time to say it — we like the Germans!” says the leader in the Independent, which devotes a full page to German contributions to civilization — Beethoven, Battenburg cake, nudism and false teeth top the list.
But the truth is, there’s really no longer a place for this at Euro `96. Fans are largely respectful of one another and there’s a tremendous feeling that sports has brought people together. Wealthy fans, united by a common enjoyment of soccer.
While England enjoys partisan and occasionally misguided support, the French camp receives a fax of a speech given by National Front politician Jean-Marie Le Pen at a rally in Nimes.
Le Pen derided “Half France’s team” as “foreigners” and complained they didn’t know the words to the national anthem.
The French team reacts fiercely.
“Le Pen is a fascist who makes these statements to gain publicity,” says an angry Christian Karembeu.
“When I pull on the blue shirt I’m conscious that I’m representing France and the importance of that,” says Ghanaian-born Marcel Desailly, a favorite of the press here because he speaks fluent English and Italian as well as French. “But me sing to satisfy Le Pen? I don’t think so.”
As the sun goes down, I’m sitting in my host’s living-room in Cheshire watching an England-Germany TV special, which promises great confrontations between the two nations. Had it been English wins — 1966 and a couple of friendlies — it would have been the world’s shortest show.
As it is, I look out of the window and see a bunch of kids in Liverpool, England and Juventus shirts, running up and down the street screeching “Engerland” in pre-pubescent voices, and kicking a ball about between the parked cars. It’s a nice image, made better by the fact that there’s no treacly voiceover that says “Football’s Coming Home.”
Which, in a sense, it has.
June 26 — England’s lucky strip’ not so lucky
“You’re going to Old Trafford?” says David, the kid next door, a diehard Manchester United fan, Cantona and Giggs posters all over the place. “What you doing that for?”
“Long story,” I say airily. “One day, you’ll understand …”
“Got it wrong, didn’t you?” he gloats wielding some hedge clippers. “Hark at the expert!”
“Don’t you have some hedges to trim or something?” I say. Smart-alecky teenagers.
“France?” he laughs. “Without Cantona, they’re crap.”
He’s right. On every count. Last weekend, I had an epiphany. Usually, I ignore them, this time I didn’t. I thought France would face Portugal in Manchester, while England would play Croatia in London.
I boldly put my cross down for Old Trafford at the accreditation desk, and even dropped $15 on Croatia beating Germany and Portugal beating the Czech Republic at the Anfield bookies Saturday night.
Come Sunday night, the betting slip is in shreds at the bottom of a Manchester trash can and I’m about to attend the dullest semifinal in the history of dull semifinals. Friends and family have quizzed me at length about my faulty logic (half of them have asked for Wembley tickets, too), but I assure them —
without much conviction — “It’ll be great.”
Another revelation dawns on me in the car — England vs. France in the final — followed by another stop at the bookies. Followed by another blown $15 bet.
France-Czech Republic is horrible. The place is half-empty, the match is dreadful and I’m surrounded by journos smoking godawful cheap cigars and pipe tobacco.
Result? After two-plus hours, I have a terrible cold, a pounding headache, my guts ache from bad cafeteria food and I’m $15 lighter.
Having sat through the postgame in which Czech coach Dusan Uhrin looks like he’s the one that lost out at the bookies, I’m not the greatest mood to watch the Big One.
England appears in a change strip of indigo. David Davies, the England team’s liaison officer, has reminded us — tongue stuck in cheek — that England is two-for-two in its “lucky strip” (Bulgaria and a Hong Kong Select XI).
“The English strip …. was in fact beautiful,” writes the novelist A.S. Byatt in one of the more laughable Sunday articles. “Like floating shadows on the bright emerald-gold grass, the colour of Monet’s shades.”
The assembly at the Old Trafford press center thinks it looks like something colored ran in the wash.
And goalkeeper David Seaman “… was resplendent,” writes Byatt. “A striding scarlet lord, entirely comfortable in his beauty. A bullfighter.”
Back on Planet Earth …
“Oh my God, it’s fancy dress!” cries one media center worker. “Seaman’s come as a bloody sweet wrapper.”
England begins brightly. Paul Ince cracks a volley in from 25 yards that Andy Koepke punches over the bar. England wins a corner.
Paul Gascoigne takes a rare near-post corner and Tony Adams flicks it on for the unmarked Alan Shearer to head home.
England leads after three minutes, but the hamstrung Germans — Juergen Klinsmann’s injury reduces the squad to 15 outfield players — bounce back and equalize in the 16th minute. David Platt, a shadow of his former self, is stripped by Stefan Freund, who plays a sweeping ball forward. Andy Moeller, on the edge of the area, plays a short ball to Thomas Helmer on the left. Helmer threads the ball through the England defense to Stefan Kuntz, who beats Stuart Pearce to the far post and slots the ball past David Seaman.
The game settles into a rhythm of English probings and Germany packing the back, but coming forward with dangerous and intelligent passing movements. And by the time the whistle for fulltime is blown, the cold and the blown bets are behind me. Fandom has crept up on me and I’m utterly absorbed.
I watch the overtime through my fingers: Darren Anderton hits the post and I’m out of my seat; Stefan Kuntz puts the ball in the net but it’s disallowed for pushing and I breathe again; and when Gascoigne fails to connect a couple of chances, I’m banging the table in frustration.
Every German attack is met with a growing feeling of nausea, which is compounded by a Manchester United doorman, who announces in booming tones, “Oh dear! That’s it! We’ve lost! We’re sunk! You’re a bloody lemon, Gascoigne!”
I’ve no option but to believe him because I’m eyeballing my lifeline.
“Can you stand it, all this tension?” says the anchorman as penalties beckon. No we can’t, is the consensus.
According to the doorman, every England penalty-taker will miss “because they’re crap” and his punditry proves marginally better than mine, because one of them, Gareth Southgate, eventually does.
Andy Moeller puts his effort past Seaman, then pouts for the camera. Germany wins 6-5 on penalties, and the English add 1996 to the growing list of soccer might-have-beens that began in Mexico in 1970 and runs through to Italia `90.
I make the long walk back to the parking lot and listen to Radio 5 Live on the way home, where the former Minister of National Heritage David Mellor (who resigned from the government on account of an extra-marital affair — his mistress later revealed he liked to wear his Chelsea uniform in bed) smarmily hosts the phone-in show, which is jammed with the legions of the gutted and the sick-as-parrots.
By the time I exit the M6, I’m laughing aloud. Fans are the same the world over, but no one loses quite as hilariously as the English.
Thursday, June 27 — English attention now turns to Wimbledon
This morning it’s not quite so funny. The headlines are full of stories about noble losses, but there was a riot in Trafalgar Square after the game. Riot police arrested 100 fans after skirmishes, two cars were overturned and set fire to, and in Sussex a Russian student is in intensive care after being confused with a German fan and repeatedly stabbed. In Brighton, the Coast Guard rescues seven England fans after they leaped off the pier.
At Bisham Abbey, Terry Venables says goodbye to the press and players before embarking on half-a-dozen lawsuits this fall — where the judges are unlikely to be as lenient as England’s Euro `96 match referees.
“The performance was magnificent, the only thing wrong was the result,” says Venables.
And poor old Southgate wakes up to see his distraught face plastered over the front, middle and back pages of the newspaper.
“I felt for Gareth. I know how it feels,” says Stuart Pearce, who introduced the Sex Pistols together with the squeaky-clean Southgate at Finsbury Park last Sunday — I sense a corrupting influence at work here.
But there’s one dissenting voice.
“He should have belted it,” says Southgate’s mom, Liz — no doubt a caller on the David Mellor show.
Still, England has gone from being cuckoo clots to lion kings in the space of three weeks and the nation turns its attention to Wimbledon, where you can be sure of one thing — the Brits always lose.
But the English interest in Euro `96 has been phenomenal: 26 million households tuned into last night’s game. The National Grid in Wokingham reported a 1,600 megawatt surge at the end of the game, as 640,000 tea kettles were switched on.
Celebs at the game included Henry Kissinger, Pele and Labour leader Tony Blair. Prime Minister John Major watched the game on TV, as did Prince William and his pals at Eton, who were given special TV privileges.
Car plant workers in the West Midlands weren’t, however, and 100 employees downed tools and repaired to the nearest hostelry. The class system lives on, even where the People’s Game is concerned.
Sunday, June 30 — Queen makes appearance
The day of the final. The neutrals favor the underdog Czechs, the Germans are out in force and everyone is wondering: Will anyone show up?
They do, in numbers. They’re subjected to another rendering of the funereal dirge “We’re all in this together” by Simply Red and some show tunes by the cast of Les Miserables for their pains.
At 6.45 p.m, there’s a trumpet voluntary on the sideline, signifying the entrance of royalty. Colleague Paul Gardner is already in the seat next to me, so it must be … Prince William’s grandma, taking time away from the horses to slum it at the soccer.
Wearing a turquoise suit and a hat that looks suspiciously like a cake, Queen Elizabeth II stands through three national anthems (the first is her own) and meets the players.
We’re all in a dreadful first half together, but things brighten at halftime. The deejay plays “Three Lions On A Shirt” and the place is awash with English, Czech and German flags.
Then Venables appears to a standing ovation to collect the Fair Play Award.
“I suppose it’s something but I’d trade it for a place in the final,” he remarked at his farewell press conference.
To cries of “4-1 to the Engerland,” the Teletoeters appear to collect the best fans award on behalf of the Netherlands. Then a trumpeter strikes up and the band performs a medley of soccer favorites to the delight of the crowd, which is on its feet and singing and dancing along — even UEFA president Lennart Johansson bops along on the touchline.
The band disappears into a throng of shaking hands and the second half is under way.
Forty-five minutes and two goals — one of them an iffy penalty — later, we’re in overtime before Oliver Bierhoff pops up to score the winning goal.
It’s a farcical end to a decent final, but the Germans don’t care — they’re too busy celebrating.
A chant goes up at the German end applauding the Czechs as they collect their medals. Juergen Klinsmann hobbles up to the royal box to receive the Henri Delaunay Trophy in the stadium full of popping flashbulbs.
The German players crouch behind a sign in adidas T-shirts — there’s nothing quite as duff as corporate, choreographed spontaneity — and then it’s all over. After 31 matches, 61 goals and 3,035 minutes of soccer, Germany is the European champion and I head back to the city center with the quote from Gary Lineker spinning around in my head: “Two teams, one ball, one referee and the Germans always win.”
In Trafalgar Square, a small mob sits at the bottom of Nelson’s Column, singing, “If you all hate Germans, clap your hands!” There’s a smattering of applause and I head for the railway station to discover my train’s running late.
Yes, football came home, but England never changes.
by Soccer America Senior Editor Duncan Irving