England's Tales of World Cup Woe

Oh well, there goes another major tournament passing us by without England troubling the latter stages and seemingly breaking the hearts of the nation. I was six years old during Spain '82 and Mexico '86 is the first one I can properly remember and ever since then there has been a sorry tale of woe following us wherever we go.

All of which got me thinking, since that heavily disputed goal in extra-time of the '66 final have we had any kind of good luck or fortune at any point in any championships at all? I can think of many, many occasions of filthy, stinking rotten luck, but can't think of one where we can say the rub of the green has gone in our favour.

I'm not saying there is any big conspiracy against us, and I'm not saying that any of these events have specifically cost us glory, but charting back through world cups and Euros that I can remember there can't have been many nations on the wrong end of as many examples of bad luck and horrendous officiating as we have!

1986 v Argentina - I don't think we will ever forget Maradona and his 'Hand of God' for as long as we live, I still blame Shilton for not coming out and cleaning him out (after playing the ball first of course) but even so, it still remains possibly the most famous example of cheating in football. If we'd have beaten them in that game and reached the semis to face Belgium who knows what would have happened?
1990 v West Germany - Ok, losing on penalties can't really be described as being 'bad luck' as there obviously is masses of skill involved, but that one still hurts, especially when we got that close only to be denied from 12 yards.
1996 v West Germany - Not a World Cup, but if only Gazza had his long studs on in the semi-final his desperate slide might have just knocked the ball into the net, thus avoiding another penalty disaster at the hands of the Germans and surely we would have defeated the Czechs at Wembley?
1998 v Argentina - Beckham's sending off at the start of the second half was ridiculous and Sol Campbell's goal late on should have stood and put us into the quarter-finals, but was cruelly disallowed and denied us once more (although it would have denied the world from seeing Dennis Bergkamp's wonder goal, which is still one of my favourite ever goals). Defeated on penalties again, I can see a trend developing...
2002 v Brazil - Seaman stays on his line and he catches Ronaldinho's free-kick easy-peasy, however he decided to shuffle forward a few paces and ends up looking a right tit. "Bad luck"? Perhaps not, but maybe a touch unfortunate to be on the receiving end of such an incredible piece of skill.
2006 v Portugal - Yet another ridiculous sending off in a winnable quarter-final, this time it was Rooney at the hands of that winker/****er Ronaldo (delete as applicable). A real game-changer, we'd have won that game had the ref not been such a pussy. Penalties did for us, yet again.
2010 v Germany - Everyone remembers 2010 as the year we got turned over and humiliated by the Germans, however had Lampard's shot which landed a good two feet over the line been allowed as it should have been then we would have been 2-2 and still game on and who knows what might have happened?
2014 v Uruguay - The ref blatantly bottle it with Godin who should definitely have been sent off in the first half, which surely would have changed the game with so much of it left to play.

Actually forget what I said earlier about there not being a conspiracy against us, having though about it in detail it now becomes obvious there is a massive conspiracy against us! I think as we invented the sport we should take our ball back and refuse to play any more until we get some guarantees of some good luck, and perhaps some dodgy refereeing decisions in our favour for once!

 

Thanks for cheering me up Munky. Pretty fair assessment though all things considered.

 

You missed 2004 vs Portugal when the ref gave a foul because Sol was climbed on another England defended. We would have played Greece in the final!

 

We never lost a game at the 1982 finals where we played 6 won 4 drew 2 and still got knocked out in the second group stage! Just imagine that! We didn't lose a game but still got knocked out!

 

Going back a bit further, mustn't forget the dual stitch-up of the 1970 Mexico World Cup when Bobby Moore was falsely detained in Bogota for allegedly stealing a bracelet, and Gordon Banks getting food poisoning the night before the quarter-final, meaning Peter Bonetti had to play which ultimately cost us a place in the semis.

And West Germany's goal in Italia 1990 was pretty damn unlucky as well, Brehme's free kick could have deflected off Paul Parker and gone anywhere, but it decided to lob over Shilton and leave him stranded.

I tell you, it doesn't half suck being a England fan at these tournaments, surely we're due just a tiny bit of luck in one of them aren't we??

 

Surely we use up all our luck to even qualify, because the performances we have been putting in more recently, makes it hard to imagine we deserve our spot!

Bah!

 

Also in 1990, the only way the germans got close was that deflected free-kick, other than that we should have been in the final.

- Sorry munky just read your post above.

 

At least our players didn't catch rabies from a rabid uruguay.

 

Thanks for the memories

 

We used up all our luck winning it in 1966!!!!

 

I've watched Hurst's "goal" off the underside of the bar in 1966 time after time after time and the more I watch it, the more convinced I am that the ball didn't cross the line.

That was a massive stroke of good luck for us, wasn't it Munky?

 

I refer you to paragraph 2 of my original post:

I agree that it was dubious, and I agree that there is a good chance it didn't completely cross the line, though the reaction of Roger Hunt who wheeled away rather than finish it off suggests that there is also a decent chance that it might have.

Either way, it certainly wasn't as clear cut as Lampard's in the last tournament!

 

There was a train of thought that the Russian linesman who awarded the goal had lost family members to the Nazis during the war and therefore was more than happy to persuade the referee to award the goal.

 

Ok, we've established that we might have been a touch fortunate about that one 48 years ago - but I'm more interested in our catastrophic run of bad fortune at every single World Cup that we've qualified since!

 

All teams have bad luck at some point, its why its down to chance.

England have never been good enough to cope with having any. The decent sides are.

There is really no need to blame any failings on chance, just a collaboration of bad decisions year on year by those who run the game in this country. It will never change because nobody ever points the finger at them.

 

But they weren't all "bad luck" or "chance" were they? Five of the examples I gave were down to incompetent officiating, bad decisions made by referees and not simply "those who run the game in this country".
What exactly could they have done about Lampard's goal that wasn't given in South Africa? How was Rooney's ludicrous red card against Portugal the fault of the FA?

No other country has had such a consistent run of bad decisions and, if you like, bad luck go against them with nothing good coming back the other way, not even close.

 

Your missing my point, those that win the tournaments are good enough to overcome these things.

Ronaldhino against England, they were down to 10 men and dominated the game, they were good enough to overcome

Lampard against Germany, we were totally outplayed for 90

The reason people go on about good luck to win tournaments is because when a team wins a tournament any bad luck leading up to it is forgotten about and never mentioned.

If we'd beaten Germany, then the ball over the line thing would not even be mentioned.

This perceived bad luck is an affliction for all teams who never win anything. All teams get it, it is just not as relevant to those who consistently win.

 

There is truth in what you're saying.

The problem is actually that bad luck is not shared fairly. Some get more, some get less. And whatever they say, it does not even itself out over a season. The biggest and best teams get the most luck (because they have the ability and resources to gamble).

 

So it is in fact less to do with luck and more to do with calculated gambles because of better players.

 

You have to be lucky enough to have better players!