Is it Coming home ?

In yesterday’s action, we witnessed two of most unbelievable games you will ever see. It started with one of the craziest own goals ever scored. Spain overcame that and took a lead only for Croatia to claw their way back from a two goal deficit with five minutes to go. Croatia then conceded two goals in extra time in the space of two minutes. Espana have now scored ten goal in their last two matches, having gone from a team that could not hit a barn door to one which can not miss.

Having barely had to time to recover, the cheesemakers took an early lead only to miss a penalty and then concede three in the space of twenty minutes. However, they showed a tenacity never seen by a Swiss team before and made holes of the Les Bleus rearguard to force the game into extra time and take the game to penalties.

This type of thing is great theatre and as the Froggie jewel in the crowd, Mbappe stepped forward to take his penalty, those with an understanding of how these things work, just knew he would not score.

I doubt the Frogs were singing that old favorite. Non, Je ne regrette rien, as in the half hour that they actually tried to play they were unstoppable. They should never have let the Fondue lovers back in.

There are two games today, but only one which really means anything, one which is steeped in footballing and national history. With all due respect to the flat pack merchants from Sweden and the Cossacks of the Ukrainian Steppe, no one outside of those two countries cares a fig what happens or may even bother to watch, after they will have finished watching the old rivalry between EnGerLand and Deutschland played out at Wembley stadium.

Forget the two world wars, (although of course the EnGerLand fans will not) the innumerable clashes between these nations over the past fifty-five years read like a list of battles on a regimental flag. It started in 1966 when EnGerLand defeated the Hun, four to two after extra time in the World Cup Final at Wembley, with a controversial goal given by a Soviet linesman. 

The ball bounced down off the crossbar onto the goal line and without the aid of goal line technology it was up to the linesman to make the call. The war was only 20 years past, this is pure conjecture but who knows what he was thinking about as he made the decision to award the goal.

Impossible to tell from this angle and in Black and White

Since that day in July 1966, the nations have met four more times in knock out matches in either the world cup or the Euros and Ze Shermans have won them all.
It started with Mexico 1970 where a mysterious outbreak of food poisoning in the EnGerLand camp led to a number of players including legendary goalkeeper Gordon Banks being unavailable. 

Fast forward, to Italia 1990, and a semi final defeat on penalties in the game famous for the tears of a clown as Paul Gascoigne received a yellow card which would have kept him out of the final if EnGerLand had won. 

Hop forward six year, Euros at Wembley, sound familiar, another penalty defeat shoot out with the losing penalty being missed by one Gareth Southgate the present EnGerLand manager. I wonder if he is suffering from PTSD like flashbacks at the moment.

The 1996 shoot out with musical accompaniment.

Cape Town 2010 and Ze Shermans get their goal line moment, when another shot, by Fat Frankie Lampard, bounced down off the crossbar and was not given for not having crossed the line, have a look and tell me what you think. 

Uruguayan Linesman did not see this as over the line

As a long suffering EnGerLand fan who was a five-month-old baby in July 1966, one can maybe understand my lack of faith in EnGerLand being able to come out victorious tonight.

A little mention of the war, even though Basil Fawlty implored us not to mention it. The English football association is worried that the EnGerLand fans might sing some songs to gee the players on, old family favourites, such as "ten German bombers in the air" to the tune of ten green bottles. Another favourite is Hitler only has one ball and the tunes to bridge over the river Kwai and the dam busters’ films. They have threatened to ban any fan who sing these ditty's which is sad as they are only a bit of banter. 

My heart obviously says EnGerLand but if they can not win it in the ninety or one hundred minutes available, then my head is telling me Ze Shermans.

In the later game, Sweden should see off Ukraine.