IT'S the most sickening sight in football. No, not Wayne Rooney leaving studmarks in an opponents jockstrap. Grown men crying; blubbing like infants because they have lost. Jeez, get a life.
Big hard footballers are supposed to be steely, focussed, determined, objective and philosophical about the nature of their game and the possibility of defeat. Instead it turns out these metrosexual new men are emotionally incontinent drama-queens and almost incapable of handling a set-back without breaking down in tears.
Beckham was crying at being substituted and that was bad enough. But on the whistle they were all at it. Big mean gangsta pranksta Rio, hard as nail John Terry, scouse skinhead Stevie G, rallying cry merchant Gary Neville, all weeping and wailing like schoolgirls told McFly had split. Group hug? Where's Trisha when you need her?
And that was only losing in the quarters. Had it been the final the Samaritans would have had to cancel all leave and send crack squads of dedicated celebrity councillers straight to Baden-Baden. And that is just for the WAGS. The girls will be gutted now their domination of the tabloid news and fashion pages has been so cruelly ended by the ineptitude of their fellas. All the precious picture space will now be taken up with the lads crying.
What a bunch of wusses. I'm embarrassed for them. You wouldn't have seen Graeme Souness, Dean Glover and Nigel Pearson crying just because they lost. Sorry to sound like me mam, but it's only a game. And not even a big one at that, really. England go out in quarters shock! It's not as if that hasn't happened before.
Look, I'm not an unfeeling robot. I had moist peepers at Cardiff. I understand the power of emotion. But that was the cup final. That was redemption after a century of heartache. That was a release of joy and relief at the end of a long, demanding quest. That was Boro. But please, no one cries over England losing in a quarter-final.
You can understand Gazza crying at Italia 90, after all he was a troubled soul faced with the prospect of missing the Word Cup final. And you can understand Lee Cattermole crying, a powerless teenager seeing the team he loves ripped apart. But they are exceptions. Most footballers are hardened to events on the pitch and take even the biggest blows in their stride. Or they used to.
This new crying phenonoma is quite revealing. It points to a post-Diana change in the perception of public displays of emotion once seen as a weakness that has gripped football as much as other spheres of life. Conspicuous compassion is very much de rigeur and our public figures are expected to reflect collective emotions.
But maybe that obvious inability to contain and control emotions hints at a reason for Team England's failure. Is it neccessary to suppress emotion in order to be successful? Does sublimation of external fears and anxieties and expectations help create a powerful dynamic and drive sportsmen to victory? If defeat brings tears were you so emotionally weak and unfocussed all along that victory was never a realistic prospect?
And it is not just the players. The television news shows scenes of grown men across the nation with tear streaked face paint and I despair. Have these people never watched a football match before? Is the media hyped expectation so high that failure has induced a national breakdown? Where is the stoicism, the resignation and the cynical defeatism that is the normal state of hardened supporters?
A decade a go no-one cried when their team lost or got relegated, except the very young and the very drunk. Disappointment and failure was accepted as part of the natural order in football. Were we poorer fans then for not blubbing? Or just more realistic?
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