England F

I'm just glad Bobby Moore wasn't around to witness last night's abject performance from the latest incumbents wearing three lions on their breast.

Having spent a lot of my adult life watching mainly third and fourth tier football, the performance by our hapless yellow boot wearing no hopers was akin to that of the many lower league journeymen I've seen over the years whose best years are clearly behind them. It's hard to comprehend, but the manager and his squad have had four years to prepare for this tournament. Four years. You'd think in that time the keeper would have learned how to defend corner kicks and that the strikers would have been coached how to hit a barn door with their banjos. But as my mother always tells me: 'You know what thought did.'