As Euro 2008 looms, I am in the bizarre position of almost enjoying the fact that the England team are sunning themselves on a beach instead of getting in the way of the real action. Back in 1950 England were beaten 1-0 by the USA national side and according to the Times, a journalist receiving the result via telegraph machine in London presumed that someone had made a spelling mistake and that the score had in fact been 1-10. Although this scoreline may have been slightly lucky the 6-3 defeat to Hungary a few years later was most certainly not. Again the English press were in disbelief that anybody to defeat the great country that invented the game. 50 years on I'm not sure things have moved on as much as they should have. Every tournament the press tell us that we should be challengeing  for the trophy and that our big players will carry us through. Before the 2006 world cup, when Rooney had his metatarsal scare (another great English footballing tradition) I heard one pundit say that if Rooney was fit we were guarenteed to win the world cup. Although this was far form a common belief it does sum up the press hype perfectly. Wayne Rooney is not even the best attacking player at Manchester United. I think we all know who that is, however I don't think he is quite as good as Tevez. And yet somehow he is good enough to win the World cup single handedly- a feat Ronaldinho was unable to acheive. I believe that our main problem is a lack of skill with the ball on the ground. We need players who can take the opposition on by dribbling and playing short simple passes and through balls- its too easy to smack the ball in the general direction of Crouch's head and it doesn't work. The one player we have who is capable of doing this regularly is Joe Cole. The press and scousers both rave about Steven Gerard and call him a world class player. I'll admit that he is very good at running in a straight line with the ball and if he isn't tackled then he can kick it high and hard at another player or he can kick it high and hard towards the goal. The amount of time he gives the ball away in good position is horrific. If only he would just play a short simple ball or try and take on a player with a nice step over (I never thought I'd say that!). Having said all of this I think that I saw an improvement in the two recent friendlies and I think that Cappello is definately the man to install some technical quality. Also I would beg Fabio to keep Beckham in the team for the time being because his ability to create assists is second to no one in the English team.  

With my rather extended rant over I was wondering what people thought about who will win Euro 2008. My money is on the Germans as they have managed to avoid nearly all of the major teams in their half of the draw. Italy, France and the Netherlands have all got a chance but when it comes to big names espeacially from the Premiership I think Spain are the team to beat. They won't win it though because Spain never win anything. Another possibility is that one of the Eastern European teams will emerge- possibly Russia. I'd love to know what people think.  

At the moment I'm not a great PSV fan. I'm still upset about them knocking us (Arsenal) out of the Champions league with that one lucky goal (well to be fair it was quite good). Of course they then went on to completely roll over against Liverpool who completely outplayed them. Even Peter Crouch managed to score (I think). And so we were set up with a Liverpool-Chelsea semi (again!) which guarenteed an english club in the final. Even better than that, Man United were also in the other semi meaning there was almost a complete English monopoly on the Champions League. Although I was extremely disappointed that Arsenal weren't a part of it I was also pleased that England was a force in the Champions League again. In the time between United winning it in 1999 and Liverpool winning it in 2005 an English club getting to the semis was a rarity with the quarters a far more realistic prospect.

When Liverpool won the competetion in 2005 the rest of the country collectively fainted in shock and disbelief. They famously beat Chelsea on there way to that final and last night we were in for a repeat performance. Chelsea fans were saying that they had learnt their lesson from last time and that there was no way that they could lose. I believed them. Again I was suprised. Tonight United could make it the first ever all English Champions League final but even if they do I can't see any result other than another Liverpool victory. They seem to have the knack of winning crucial cup matches just like Mourinho pointed out. He obviously ment this to be a derogatory thing, suggesting that they did not have the quality to challenge for the league but he's the one who's crying this morning, not Rafa. Far from doing the quadruple its looking like Chelsea's only trophy this season could be the league cup. So its good luck to Liverpool I say because we can't have another United win.

Interestingly if Milan beat United then it will be a repeat of the 2005 final. Well I thought it was interesting anyway.          

Last summer we went through the usual performance of hyping England's chances of a second glorious world cup victory. Some clever dickie noticed that it was forty years since we last won it and that we really should have a real go of winning it this time. Unfortunately no one told told Sven and co so we crashed out on penalties feeling a bit silly.

 We English like to have someone to blame for our problems so we wasted no time in searching for a culprit. Sven was the obvious target, so obvious in fact that he had already announced he was going to step down after the tournament because he was tired of the pressure of the British media (best thing the News of the World ever did). After being out witted by Sven we all turned on the next big face of the team- the captain. However Becks was one step ahead of us (being no stranger to press hate campaigns after world cups) and he stepped down as captain and went to Spain and hid. It seems not even Cappello has been able to find him this season but thats another story.

We as the public were now baffled. We had no scapegoat and we needed one. Then we all realised, how about the Johnny foreigners who had the discurticy and sheer rudeness to beat us- The Portugese. It was all there fault. It was even there fault that our star player stupidly got himself sent off. He was betrayed by his Manchester United teammate and friend (well he might have been) who did exactly what Rooney would have done had the roles been reversed and complained to the referee. Rooney was then sent off and we, the public had our hate figure                Cristiano Ronaldo (or as my friend calls him 'that winking...diving.......arrgh!')

I would consider myself to be one of the more sensible members of the public. I've never read the daily star for instance. And I was quick to point out that if Rooney hadn't decided to stomp on Carvalho then there wouldn't have been a problem in the first place. Therefore I was fully up for forgiving the prince of the stepover, except for one thing........ that WINK ('that winking...diving.......arrgh!'). It embodied everything I hate about the modern footballer. It proved beyond any doubt that he had intentionally tryed to manipulate the ref and of course he had succeded.

As it turned out I wasn't the only one who was a bit miffed by Ronaldo's antics ('that winking...diving.......arrgh!') and the press too started a hate campaign (well it wasn't quite a hate campaign, it was more like a campaign of mild disgruntlement). Even United supporters were torn as to whether to side with Ro or Ro.

There is so much to about Ronaldo that annoys me. I hate his greaced back hair with its stupid highlights. I hate his ear ring. I hate his girly step overs. I hate how girls swoon over him (that one admittedly could be down to a problem of my own, jealousy). I could go on. And why not. I'm not busy. I hate his extreme confidence (bordering on arrogance) and self assurance, pesonafied by that wink('that winking...diving.......arrgh!').

All in all I'm not his greatest fan. However when he gets onto the pitch I can't look away (and its not because of his hair). His dribbling is mesmeric. He has the same air of Ronaldinho at his best when you don't actually believe that it is possible to tackle him. it feels like he could take on the whole opposition team. Some other United player described him as the best player in the world and for once I didn't retort 'What about Henry?' straight away. No I waited a couple of seconds and then said it. But even so from me thats a sign of respect ('that winking...diving.......arrgh!').