I might never be able to say that I've seen England win an international trophy, but I will be able to say that I've seen their worst World Cup result, so that's something. I was far less upset by losing 4-1 to Germany than by Fulham's narrow loss in the Europa League Final, or by the various England penalty exits. This is largely because, unlike those occasions, we were definitely outplayed. Given that I follow Fulham and Stockport County, losing to teams better than you is something I'm pretty familiar with.
I suppose the interesting thing about the *cough* "Golden Generation" is that, being pretty much the same age as them, their decline sort of mirrors my own. The biggest opportunity they missed, I always felt, was the Quarter-Final in the 2002 World Cup, in which they outplayed Brazil for 45 minutes before falling prey to Beckham thinking the ball had gone out and David Seaman - who had been down for several minutes with a back injury just before - being chipped by Ronaldinho. Since then it's pretty much been downhill all the way, and the time is finally here to scrap most of them, and see what the Agbonlahor/Wilshere/Welbeck generation are like in the 2012 qualifiers. And with Heskey finally gone, maybe Zamora will actually get a call-up.
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