BS: Sorry for England

Subject: BS: Sorry for England
From: Ranks
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 05:35 PM

I never thought I would say it. But I feel very sorry for England. That match was the best I have seen for along time. It should have been the final.

Ranks

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Ranks
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 05:40 PM

I have had quite a few drinks during the match, so I write things I probably would not say with a clear brain. Although I always support our German team I have to say: Having seen that match I now know that we have not deserved to reach the quarter finals.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: sledge
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 05:44 PM

And now those miserable gits who aren't that keen on football and moan about it despite the enjoyment it brings many others can rest quietly in their beds now, assured that it won't intrude so much on their day to day lives for some time.

Sledge

ps portugal were better.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: GUEST,scottish jake
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 05:52 PM

To quote that great folkie, Cat Stevens ........................... My Heart is Bleeding!!

John frae Scotland

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Rasener
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 06:00 PM

I think that England did not play that well. They defended for far too long.

Neville should have taken the player out before he got the shot in for Portugals second goal.

David beckham to me was not up to his normal standard and over the competition, should not have been in the team. He has missed 2 penalties, and hasn't scored a goal. Not what we expect from him.

From what I could see of action replays, the referee made a bad decision when he didn't allow the goal for England at the end of 90 minutes.

Frank Lampard came good again, and although Portugal made a mistake in defence, I thought owen's goal was taken very cleverly.

All in all a dissapointing finish for England, but they did their best.

I will now have to support my wifes team - Holland :-)
Come on you cloggies.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: sledge
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 06:04 PM

Ditto.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: greg stephens
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 06:09 PM

It's only a game

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Ranks
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 06:10 PM

Dear Villan,

it was absolutely correct that the referee did not allow that goal. In all countries in the world, this was a foul - except England. I know that your country has a slightly different interpretation of the rules especially when it comes to goalkeepers in their area. But in international tournaments you have to accept this decision.
Still it was a cruel match for England.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Ranks
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 06:11 PM

Dear Greg,

It is not only a game. It is football!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Ed.
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 06:22 PM

Sorry, Ranks but I'm in total agreement with Greg Stephens here.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: GUEST
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 06:22 PM

Sorry Ranks, I've watched over a thousand live games and countless numbers in highlights, and that was a Sol campbell goal. Beckham is shot. Too many outside distractions. Cole is my player of the tournament so far.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Bassic
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 06:30 PM

Cole was a liability in the first half......a yard behind the game.....I would have taken him off..........and I would have been wrong......the rest of the match he was superb. Sol C was awsome......and it was a very simple and clear goal.........the Porugese keeper was miles away and didnt have a chance of getting near the ball......the two English players just stood where they were and jumped up for the ball.....all legal and above board like.......what say you BE? (All the best refs are bald BTW!!;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: mooman
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 06:38 PM

Well Portugal were the better team on the night but England played with resolution and came back into it well at the end...

Sol Campbell played a blinder as he so often does and, sorry Ranks, the replay seems to show there was no touch at all on any Portuguese player and it seemed a perfectly good goal. The loss of Rooney seemed to leave nothing worthwhile in midfield which simply fell apart. Beckham is totally out of form.

The ref was useless throughout, give me the wonderful Mr Collina anytime!

Bad luck England and well done Portugal.

Peace

moo

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Ranks
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 06:40 PM

The fact, that only the English say,it was a goal, proves me right.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Linda Kelly
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 07:42 PM

On what basis wasn't it a goal Ranks -the goalkeeper was not fouled. Terry and Campbell were both facing away from the goal keeper, who fell into them and was not pushed away. The refereeing was deplorable throughout. Having said that Portugal was the better side although they couldnt finish. we were underform and the passing was patheitc. Cole was excellent as was campbell. Beckham was under par but at the end of the day Portugal played well enough to win, I have no sour grapes, but the instances of us having goals disallowed againstus in major tournaments is alarming.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: akenaton
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 07:42 PM

Terry had his arm across the Portugese goalkeepers' shoulder,stopping him from getting to the ball,and at the same time acted as a prop for Campbell to gain height.It was actually a very brave decision.
Of course, the morons who who give their opinions on TV,once again demonstrated their ignorance of the basic rules ...Ake

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Manitas_at_home
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 08:10 PM

Campbell only touched the goalie coming down,after the ball was in the net.However,Beckham could have regained the match by staying away from the penalty shoot-out. I know damn little about football but he has a reputation for missing penalties when the pressure is on. If he had put someone else on we might have had a few more minutes for our session .

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 08:36 PM

The fact that only the English say it was a goal...

How on Earth could you know that to be the case, Ranks?

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 24 Jun 04 - 09:03 PM

As I said on the Annexe, I have mixed feelings over this.

I travelled the approx 20 miles from Roughton (nr Cromer) to the Nelson in Norwich to get to a session cancelled by the pub because of the football...

Jon

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: sledge
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 02:17 AM

Don't they have telephones in Norwich?

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Rasener
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 02:20 AM

Thats bad Jon. Didn't anybody try to notify you.
Or was it a case of you just going along, only to find thta the pub had overruled the Folkies.
Doesn't say much for the pub.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Wolfgang
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 03:18 AM

The chairman of the German referees said (to several slow motions) that the 'goal' would have been given in England probably but that the actual decision of the referee can be regarded as correct according to the continental standard. But the opposite decision also would have been no mistake.

Is there really nobody daring to tell Beckham to stay away from the penalty point in that situation? That's his third miss for England in his last three tries.

We could now restart the two years old quarrel about the use of exercising penalties.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: alanabit
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 03:51 AM

Justice was done. A fairer reflection of the game would have been a three or four goal victory for the Portuguese at the end of ninety minutes. Why an England midfield of Beckham, Gerrard, Lampard and Scholes was not able to take the game to Portugal I shall never know. The fact is that they didn't and England never looked like winning. I feel sorry for Beckham and Darius Vassell, but penalty shoot outs have a habit of producing the correct winner. They did in 1990, 1996 and 1998 and justice was done again last night. Portugal deserved to win.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: breezy
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 04:10 AM

Now we move to George Papavgeris and the Greek team.

England were totally outplayed

Opportunist first goal,-well done Michael- who said the long ball game is dead, its the only way to play when a team has no mid-field.

Too much reliance on one young man -Rooney

Looked vulnerable to crosses,

Beckham takes the 1st penalty cos we only remember the last one one to miss, crafty bugger, thinking of his image.

Players looked stale.

Cole won the battle with Renaldo until Renaldo loosened up in the closing minutes.

England deluded themselves that they could win this match and the competition, such miss-guided over-confidence

Need a vocal leader on the pitch to put fire in the bellies

Tonight Martyn Wyndham-Read in St Albans

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 04:17 AM

Agree with Villan and alanabit. I am sorry that England did not play better. Not so sorry for Beckham - I note he took the first of the penalties, an old captain's trick to try and keep any failure off people's minds as the later ones would supercede it. Still, it is nice to see teams like the Chechs coming through. Their Holland match was the best I've seen for some time. As for the Greeks...

"Hell-ass, Ra! Ra! RA!"
Greece expects the support of all Brits tonight. Right?

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 04:19 AM

Don't mind me - it's well known that we Greeks have lost out Marbles...

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Rasener
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 05:00 AM

El Greko
If Holland go out, then I will support Greece (if they get through).
I suppose I had better do that otherwise you might cancel your guest appearance at the Market Rasen Folk Club on November the 19th. :-)

The Greeks certainly know how to party. I remeber back in 1980's visiting three greek islands, Samos, Chios and Lesbos.
Whilst we were in Chios, there was a festival in one of the towns. The local fisherman took us to it in his van. It was an open air event in the square. It was absolutely humming. Mainly Greek people - one that the tourists didn't get to know about.
It was great with the band playing and people dancing eating and drinking. I worked for Polaroid at the time, and had an instant camera with me and loads of film.
One man came up to me and asked if I would take a photo of his family. This I did, and ten minutes later, he came over to our table with a tray of food and drinks for my wife and me, as a thankyou. Dont think that they had seen instant photo's before.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: GUEST,Dave
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 05:10 AM

"It's only a game"

Philistine!!

Sorry El Greko, as much as I'd love to see the Greeks win against France they haven't a hope unless Zidane breaks his metatarsal and Henry looses his va va voom.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 05:58 AM

Sledge/ Villan, in fairness to the pub, I believe they did try to contact one session regular but couldn't get hold of him (suggesting to me though that they PROBABLY only decided on the day of the session). They don't have my number and my phone is engaged a lot of the time with internet anyway but had they made contact with that person, I would have recieved an email telling me that the session was cancelled - he's pretty good at informing me and others.

It seems most session people had guessed or decided to stay away but it turned out that our regular guitarist from Beccles (Sulfolk), a fiddle player from Attleborough way (I think) as well as one from Norwich arrived (and perhaps others we didn't see looked in). That's a problem with this sesson if communications break down for some reason - I think within our perhaps 15 in terms of regular players, most travel in at least 15 miles for it.

Anyway, on to the football... I think Beckham made a huge mistake in taking the first one. I feel sure memories of his last miss would have been running too much through his mind... As for the dissalowed goal, I watched a few replays when I got home and I think the decision was borderline but correct, the goalie was hindered by someone's arm.

Jon

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 06:18 AM

Perhaps Becks did his captains job better than we thought...

Reasoning? Well. If you want your team to feel confident about penalties how about missing the first one to show that they cannot do worse? Just like me putting myself on first at the folk club so things can only get better:-)

No? Ah well...

I agree with most of the rest BTW - England never looked like winning. Just a pity that they lost because of a poor decision.

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: GUEST,noddy
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 07:30 AM

out classed, out played, out ran, out competition.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: GUEST,patriot1314
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 08:02 AM

every time a competition comes along, the english media hype up their team to the extent that the whole country believes they are going to win it.
I certainly have'nt seen any evidence that england are good enough to win a major tournament. In this one they played four and lost two and all the games were won by the better team.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: A Wandering Minstrel
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 08:25 AM

I was sorry for England too. If the rain had held off we would have whipped the Kiwis (oooh! contentious!)

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Rasener
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 09:38 AM

Kiwi's with whipped cream on sounds better to me.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: sledge
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 09:46 AM

What you do in the privacy of your own home is your business :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: GUEST,Laurent at work
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 10:07 AM

Guest Dave. I fear you're wrong. I wouldn't bet on France tonight. Against Switzerland, they played so bad that some of my co-workers and I were about to support the Swiss team.

If we don't raise our playing level tonight, I think that Zidane and his fellows will be back home at time to watch the last matches on TV.

BTW, we should have lost against England, but English team was beatten for the same reasons as yesterday.

Allez France! (sorry, it's a reflex)

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: sledge
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 10:12 AM

Right laurent, thats it, I am going to boycott French cheese, apart from Rochefort which I like :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: GUEST,Laurent at work
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 10:23 AM

It doesn't really matter Sledge, as French team, they're no more what they used to be. (For EEC's sake) Apart Roquefort may be (but I like cheddar too).

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: sledge
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 10:29 AM

I even like it when I spell it wrong!

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: GUEST,Bagpuss at work
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 10:34 AM

If the Campbell goal had been given, I still think England wouldnt have deserved to win. they were only in that fortunate position because of Portugal's amazing ability not to score goals (plus some very good defending by Campbell). Portugal had loads more posession and were forcing us back into our own half for most of the match. We defended far too deep. The midfield were lacklustre, especially given the supposed quality of the players and were playing very negatively for a substansial potion of the match. Too many long balls were played that really didn't suit the playing of the strikers and usually struggled to get the ball.

I knew if it went to penalties we would lose because we have to. It's tradition! I really hope they are not going to blame the Beckham fiasco on the pitch/penalty spot. Given that they had made a complaint about it in training, they obviously knew what it was like and the problems it could cause and should have adjusted their penalty taking accordingly.

I think Beckham should lose his captaincy over this. It was his job to pull the players together and be more proactive in his play especially after Rooney went off, but he hardly looked like a captain out there at all. I think all the recent strain in his personal life has took its toll on him. He looked a shadow of his former self.

The problem is who could be made captain in his absence?

Bagpuss

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Rasener
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 11:11 AM

Frank Lampard

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: el ted
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 11:12 AM

Frank Spencer.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: GUEST,bagpuss
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 11:15 AM

Cant be Lampard or Terry because no matter how many times I see them I can never remember what they look like...

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Rasener
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 11:30 AM

Can't be Lampard becuase he is too well spoken!!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 12:16 PM

Posh Beckham

"Come on, girls!"

Doesn't bear thinking...

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: GUEST,Taffy
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 01:16 PM

No

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: ard mhacha
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 05:19 PM

Laurent you were right, France were clueless,the Greeks were deserving winners, this reflects on the English teams performance, losing to a clapped out French side.
The hype surrounding the English team was amazing, every section of the media had forecast the team as champions, thank goodness I had the choice of RTE and knowledgeable ex players such as John Giles and Liam Brady who were less biased than the "experts"on the English stations.

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: Rasener
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 07:43 PM

I am gobsmacked. Well done Greece.

What does that tell you about the premiership?

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 25 Jun 04 - 07:51 PM

Very gratifying. Greece have been playing better since I left Greece. Perhaps if I leave England...nah.

My money is on the Chechs now...

Subject: RE: BS: Sorry for England
From: GUEST,Boab
Date: 26 Jun 04 - 02:18 AM

Aye---Henry has lost his va-va-voom and Zidane's bust metatarsal keeps him from helping in the search-------