Ever since I can remember there's nearly always been a scapegoat to blame as England exit a competition. Sometimes a player, sometimes the manager and sometimes both.
Way back in 1970 it was Peter Bonetti ........ whenever he played away from Stamford Bridge he endured dogs abuse "You lost the World Cup!"
Norman Hunter got stick for missing his tackle as Poland broke away to score and stop us from qualifying for the 74 World Cup - and Sir Alf was later sacked for this failure to qualify.
Other managers to carry the can were Steve "Wally with the Brolly" McClaren and Graham "Turnip" Taylor.
1986 saw the vitriol targeted at an opposition player - the cheating Maradona - and 2006 was somewhat similar with the winker Ronaldo cast as the villain.
Suppose the 1990 shoot-out loss to Germany was a bit of an exception - Bobby Robson emerged with credit and with the media attention on Gazza's tears, Pearce and Waddle got off fairly lightly. Everyone seemed to share Pearce's joy in the 96 shootout against Spain but I felt that Southgate took the brunt of the stick when we got knocked out at Euro 96.
Possibly the most abuse I can remember for any England player was for Beckham after getting sent off against the Argies - death threats and effigies of him being hung spring to mind - though as with Pearce, all seemed to be forgiven after his injury time screamer against Greece to qualify for 2002 followed by his winning penalty against the Argies in Japan.
Struggling to remember some of the more recent episodes - managers such as Hoddle, Eriksson and Capello came and went, both driven out by long-term media abuse - while Hodgson went before he was pushed after the Iceland debacle.
Moving on to last night......with Southgate still the media's darling, it was inevitable that the blame would fall on whichever player was considered most at fault for our defeat. Suppose this blame was shared between all 3 who missed the penalties and they just happened to be black players. Not condoning the racist element of some of the abuse, but whoever this player or players happened to be they were certain to get plenty of stick. Guess Kane was fortunate that his penalty miss against Denmark didn't cost us otherwise am sure he would have become public enemy number one while Sterling's popularity has soared as England progressed!
To finish on a positive note, the example of Beckham just goes to show that Rashford, Sancho and Saka should all get the opportunity to put this behind them and go on to become future match-winners.
The three players that missed their penalties were representing our country. Anyone that racially abuses them attacks us all. It needs to be easier to catch and prosecute the scum that do it.
Southgate only put his hand up to take that peno because Ince (the self-penned Guvn’r) bottled it.
Besides all that, we still beat any expectations we had at the start of the tournament - its great to win the thing, but a rational reaction would be that it was a success. World Cup semi-finalists, Euro finalists, next year’s World Cup…
(12-07-2021, 09:16 PM)Smirnoffexpress Wrote: [ -> ]The three players that missed their penalties were representing our country. Anyone that racially abuses them attacks us all. It needs to be easier to catch and prosecute the scum that do it.
It does indeed Smirns.
Apart from anything else, it would be interesting to know if these tossers are actually England fans, or even English.
At the moment it’s all too easy for the lazy lefties like Starmer to brand all of us racists when nothing could be further from the truth. Starmer even equated booing the ‘taking of the knee’ with racism, when it very clearly is nothing of the sort.
Guff, you’re not really in any position to make that call.
regarding catching the online abusers. There is a specialist police team for online stuff. It would have been nice to hear Boris say go back under your stone ..... and start worrying because I have instructed that team to prioritise catching you.
Just two points about the alleged racist abuse.
1. It's likely that racism was involved in the abuse of these players because the internet is an open shop to everyone, decent and vile. I'm pretty sure they got plenty of moral support too - probably overwhelmingly so. So what do we do about the 'bad' stuff? Once you get into censorship, you have to decide what is unacceptable. A slippery slope for free speech.
2. Without knowing actually what was said, we have to rely on the interpretation of the media that it was racist abuse and not just plain abuse of a person who happens to be black. I notice that when Dominic Cummings revealed Boris' texts about Hancock being '****ing hopeless' the media made the essence of the message clear without revealing any naughty words. This time we are just asked to trust them. Another slippery slope.
(12-07-2021, 10:34 PM)Hammie Wrote: [ -> ]regarding catching the online abusers. There is a specialist police team for online stuff. It would have been nice to hear Boris say go back under your stone ..... and start worrying because I have instructed that team to prioritise catching you.
Yes the Met's on line abuse team will be handling this. The PL have their own team, it was they who caught a so called Singapore fan for abusing Brighton's Neil Maupay. A Singapore court dealt with Mr Ng earlier this month
It's quite funny how people think they are anonymous on the internet or can say what they like in the name of free speech.
A racist estate agent has lost his job and a racist comedian has lost all his gigs and been dropped by his management company.
Good.
Yeh it's a shame we are having to focus on this instead of focusing on another cracking tournament from the boys. Yes it hurts, it always hurts in the end with England (and Pompey). But they took a very street wise and experienced Italy team all the way.
I really enjoyed this tournament and can't wait for the WC next year. We'll be right in the mix.
(13-07-2021, 08:56 AM)Gerry Hatrick Wrote: [ -> ]Without knowing actually what was said, we have to rely on the interpretation of the media that it was racist abuse and not just plain abuse of a person who happens to be black.
I wouldn’t mind betting that’s exactly what it was and the media are the last people I’d trust to report facts.
A lot of good points being made here.
Gaffer is right the content should be made clear to allow a fair judgement I guarantee the judgement of the likes of billy boy and the other half of the village celebrity duo would be far different to any normal person.
The authorities and social media companies need to get their acts together, it should be pretty simple to do but don't ever forget it's pretty easy to hack most social media accounts so caution has to be the watch word.
Once a case is proven it would be interesting to see the breakdown of offenders, my guess would be something like,
65% - spotty teenagers trying to impress their mates.
10% - jealous jocks trying to disgrace England.
10% - mentally deficient.
5% - Alcohol induced.
10% - Assorted degrees of racism.
So far it's another media induced state of hysteria with precious little hard facts to prove the point.
They have just found a Wolves fan that was posting vile stuff about the three penalty takers. He is saying his Twitter account was hacked. Yes, of course it was!
(13-07-2021, 12:58 PM)muschi Wrote: [ -> ]I guarantee the judgement of the likes of billy boy and the other half of the village celebrity duo would be far different to any normal person.
Unhappy people like that have to attach themselves to something because they’re desperate to belong it’s a way to escape their miserable lives.
(12-07-2021, 10:07 PM)Tufnell_Chimes Wrote: [ -> ]Besides all that, we still beat any expectations we had at the start of the tournament - its great to win the thing, but a rational reaction would be that it was a success. World Cup semi-finalists, Euro finalists, next year’s World Cup…
It was a success because we beat the Jerries at last.
(12-07-2021, 10:31 PM)Tufnell_Chimes Wrote: [ -> ]Guff, you’re not really in any position to make that call.
Which call?
That the booing was not inspired by racism?
I’m in as good a position as anyone else, certainly as good a position as Starmer, who know f all about football or football fans.
I wouldn’t have booed myself but I sympathise with those who did. As has been said many times, by many people, politics has no place in sport.
(13-07-2021, 04:14 PM)exgaffer Wrote: [ -> ] (12-07-2021, 10:31 PM)Tufnell_Chimes Wrote: [ -> ]Guff, you’re not really in any position to make that call.
Which call?
That the booing was not inspired by racism?
I’m in as good a position as anyone else, certainly as good a position as Starmer, who know f all about football or football fans.
I wouldn’t have booed myself but I sympathise with those who did. As has been said many times, by many people, politics has no place in sport.
Starmer knows plenty about football and fans . He’s played football for years and he’s a fan
(13-07-2021, 12:58 PM)muschi Wrote: [ -> ]65% - spotty teenagers trying to impress their mates.
10% - jealous jocks trying to disgrace England.
10% - mentally deficient.
5% - Alcohol induced.
10% - Assorted degrees of racism.
Which, unless my maths has let me down, equals 100% racist.
(13-07-2021, 06:42 PM)Cowespompey Wrote: [ -> ] (13-07-2021, 04:14 PM)exgaffer Wrote: [ -> ] (12-07-2021, 10:31 PM)Tufnell_Chimes Wrote: [ -> ]Guff, you’re not really in any position to make that call.
Which call?
That the booing was not inspired by racism?
I’m in as good a position as anyone else, certainly as good a position as Starmer, who know f all about football or football fans.
I wouldn’t have booed myself but I sympathise with those who did. As has been said many times, by many people, politics has no place in sport.
Starmer knows plenty about football and fans . He’s played football for years and he’s a fan
I thought we were talking about football in the ‘all the fans are racist’ sense BTC, not whether Starmer kicked a ball about once.
Judging from his recent pub based, staged, ‘one of the lads’ videos, he’s not very convincing is he? I doubt very much that he’s graced the cheap seats or terraces of a football ground for a very long time, if ever. He is therefore in no position to judge how racist real football fans are, or are not. He’s never slow to grasp a photo call though, taking the knee in his office, or sitting with a staged pint in a pub.
If you sit among real fans you don’t come across racists and if there were any display of racism it would pretty soon be called out. At least it would where I sit, is it a hotbed of racism where you are?
Starmer football fan? I don’t think so.
Errrr.....never mentioned Starmer.
The team all played or each others No Prima Donnas & made the Country proud again.
Southgate got every tactical decision right except the penalty takers I believe.
Who looked good in training didn't mean anything with 65,000 screaming fans.
The older more experienced players should have taken them not the 3 youngsters.
But I'm sure he'll learn a lot of lessons from the final & won't repeat mistakes again.
Onwards to Victory in the World Cup!
Southgate failed to respond to Italy going up through the gears. He has a good squad of 20 players rather than just 10 as previous managers have had. I think there is a question mark against him.
Guff, please go ahead and enlighten us all with your personal black experience.
…and sport has always been politics by other means. Since forever.
(13-07-2021, 08:10 PM)mikey393 Wrote: [ -> ]Onwards to Victory in the World Cup!
