A face to launch a thousand hits... in the face (or something)

While Lampard, Barry, Gerrard & Co ground out another eye-rollingly unconvincing win over Slovenia on Saturday, my (spanish) housemate let it be known that he despises the England football team. Why? "Because they're morons who wear sunglasses indoors at Movida, spitroast teenage girls and record it on their phones" (or something to that effect). Not content with this outlet of hatred,  our house spic (love him really)  made hilarious vomming noises whenever Wayne Rooney's endearingly boyish face appeared on the TV screen.

It got me thinking about how, despite wanting England to do well in international football games, I could totally see why people (of English nationality or otherwise) would revel in their continued failure. None of the current squad are particularly likable or interesting people. They are among the best-paid professional footballers in the world and, within the England framework, have not once justified their wages and, more importantly, the belief and goodwill of the fans. They punch people in (presumably crap) bars, have Westlife (fucking WESTLIFE) play their WEDDING, or are Ashley Cole. Because I'm not English but still "support" their team over Germany's, people often react dismissively, as if I was a traitor or some shit. And since this is about international rather than club football, I can sort of see their point - but I honestly could not give less of a shit about whether Germany win anything in international football. I watched a few games during the 2006 World Cup in my old school along with hundreds of Germans and felt so out of place (exaggeration alert) that last year I decided to just stay in and watch the Euro final at home by myself.

This is all pretty odd and hard to understand I guess, and  I do remember being happy when Germany won Euro 96 (in fact, I remember the intonation and words the commentator of this video uses pretty clearly), but as a weird part of the assimilation process that seems to have taken place, I've found myself doing a celebratory fist-pump whenever England score, even when it's Frank Lampard.  Out of all England's more or less current players, I actively like Hargreaves, Crouch, James, Rooney (I know, right? But he is a great, great footballer) and Walcott. Slim pickings. And yet when they line up against Croatia on Wednesday, I'll again be sat there like a mug and watch an excrutiatingly frustrating game in the hope that "the boys" will do good.

PS: If you're Spanish, it's easy to make fun of the ugliness of English players - their players all look like Take That's backing dancers or something. On the other hand, they really are ridiculously amazing at football.