England are through to their second tournament final of my lifetime, and only their third ever, and yet it still doesn’t quite feel like it. So far, there’s been none of that uncompelled participation that defined the euphoria of the last few tournaments – no lads queuing up to get imitation Phil Foden haircuts, far fewer flags, little of that sense that the football team might serve as a blazon or symbol for the nation at-large. Even Gareth Southgate’s outfits have tumbled, from those distinctive waistcoats to these awful white knit polos. The only obvious trace of the last Euros is the choruses of “Sweet Caroline” which do still leak out of the television while Harry Kane is completing his dumbfounded post-match interviews.
We have just three days to rally behind the team. Instead, we have so far been returned to the standard England-fans dynamic – resentment from below at what we see as the inadequacies of our superstars above. The criticisms have been merited. What has the system been for the past several matches? To deploy players out of position and watch them flap until we concede? And only then to make the much-delayed substitution which gives us that tempo and impetus missing for most of the game? The King himself has noticed – in his congratulatory message last night he asked if we might win the final without any “last minute wonder goals or another penalties drama”, for the sake of the nation’s “collective heart rate and blood pressure”.
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