NOW look. We spoke about this before the tournament.
Or at least I did, with Teddy Sheringham, and relayed it to you. Teddy, in the interview I did for The Sun, was at pains to point out that back among the triumphs of Euro ’96 there were plenty of moments when things didn’t go to plan.
The first game was a draw, and England were none too clever against Scotland in the first half.
And if McAllister had scored that penalty to equalise, who knows what might have happened.
But England kept their heads, and we all just about kept ours, and magical things came to pass.
As was agreed with Teddy, success is born out of grinding through the bad bits as much as celebrating magical moments. It’s getting through dodgy times that allows the brilliance to show itself.
This can — and will — still happen if we don’t despair and don’t, for heaven’s sake, boo them off the pitch.
Let’s go so far as to bring in something Churchill is supposed to have said: “The secret of success is to stagger from failure to failure without noticeable loss of enthusiasm.”
I give you one great example of a team which did just this — Portugal.
In the last Euros’ group stage, they didn’t win a single game.
They drew all three matches against Iceland, Hungary and Austria. Did they despair? Probably.
Did they then go on to win the tournament? Erm, yes.
We can still do this, for heaven’s sake.
England can learn from the Welsh.
Remember England beating Wales in Euro 2016?
Think how the Welsh must have felt.
And then look at that brilliant photo of Chris Gunter after the final whistle gesturing to his countrymen in the stadium to keep their chins up.
They went on to beat Belgium and get to the semis — England lost to Iceland.
Chins up England fans, we can still do this.
The phase of form we’re in is disappointing. And, who knows, it could all be over for us very soon, but only if we let it. This phase could also be the making of us.
What we have learnt is we’ve got to find a way of scraping through.
These are valuable skills we will need at some stage down the line if we are to win this thing — it’s as well to be getting the practice in now.
Come on England fans, we can still do this.
Source: Soccer - thesun.co.uk
