A Counterblast To Agnosticism

To those who would have us believe that 'pretty football' and 'winning football' are mutually exclusive; who believe that the primary aim of the game is to keep a clean sheet; who are happy to have teams rake in millions from a captive market while telling us "we're in the results business"; who mistrust beauty; who would praise Chelsea; who are called 'Sam Allardyce'*; who would happily see the entire population of the world enslaved as the bitches of an alien race of eight-foot, 30-stone-of-pure-muscle, endless-diagonal-balls-to-the-head-of-the-big-fella-up-front super-bastards; who would inculcate us all with their particular brand of bitter, witless self-hatred given half a chance; who probably secretly fancy Margaret Thatcher...

...to those I say: MWAH-HAH-HAH-HAH-HAH-HAH-HAH!!!

To recklessly exaggerate for a moment, this has been as close to a perfect tournament as we're likely to see: positive and often spectacularly football, heart-abusing drama, a lack of cynicism (in terms of both style and discipline**) and an honest-to-god football team triumphing. All that was missing was a hilarious snatching of defeat from the jaws of victory by England and a heroic 1-1 draw by Ireland.

It's almost too good to be true. Spain's midfield yesterday comprised Senna, Xavi, Iniesta, Fabregas and Silva, while Xabi Alonso came on as a substitute. How cool is that? (World-class analysis, there.) Something to consider: this is still a young team: the bulk of it will still be there in two years' time. I'm praying for a Spain-Argentina final in Johannesburg.

On which note, and without wishing to hastily jump to grand conclusions based on scant evidence, I nevertheless hastily conclude based on these 31 games that a loving God does indeed exist. Sure, He sets a mean test of faith, what with the last Euros, Mourinho, Abramovich, the Eduardo injury, Cyprus 5-2 Ireland, etc., et-bloody-c., but it's almost been worth it all for these last three weeks. I say almost because I'll only be fully convinced when I see Arsenal winning the Premier League again - and what the hell, the Champions League while we're at it. I mean, that's what He does, right - portents? And what else could this tournament, with its beautiful attacking football and the right team winning, possibly mean?....

No, no - now's not the time for such parochialism. Let's just wallow awhile in this, no less than the triumph of Good against Evil. Not that I take football too seriously or anything.

Photo by Hell's Donut House

*I've had a go at Allardyce before, and I will again. It may seem to you like I'm picking on him. You'd be right. There's a special circle of football hell reserved for him and his ilk.

**Wonderful stat: there were fewer red cards in the whole of Euro 2008 than in the Holland-Portugal game in the 2006 World Cup.

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(embarrassed cough)

"It was just a thought when everything was so sad. I thought life has some beautiful moments and you should tell people you love them. I wanted to show some emotion."

Ah, Raymond. I feel for you, pal. It's happened to us all. We've all done something silly while drunk on a cocktail of hope and despair, no? Some of us have proposed to our partner live on national television; whilst other among our number have rashly declared that despite our estrangement and the harsh words and icy glances we've exchanged subsequently, we're still in love with you, Dutch football!

Yep. I was one of them. It might be something to do with my being a "beautiful game"-spouting pseudo-intellectual pygmy* who's read Brilliant Orange twenty times and longs to see something in Dutch football that is, perhaps, merely a ghost these days. Perhaps I got carried away by the contrast with the vapidity of the 2004 team and the 2006 vintage's descent into record-breaking levels of indisciplined ridiculousness, in tandem with Portugal. But hey, tell me you weren't swept up by the majesty of their performance against Italy, which was surpassed by the win over France four days later. Tell me Sneijder's goal in the first game and his and Robben's against the French won't come instantly to mind when you recall this tournament in your dotage. Wasn't your heart warmed by Marco van Basten withdrawing Kuijt and Engelaar and sending on Robben and van Persie? What does that Cruijff chap know, anyway?

And like poor old Ray, we were left feeling a bit silly returning to the seaside the morning after we'd scrawled our words of devotion in six-foot-high letters on the pier wall. At least we didn't do it on live TV, I suppose.

(Oh, and Gabriele Marcotti says we're morons. Cheers, Gab.)

So, like some shameless football slut, we discard Holland now that they've fulfilled their usefulness and jump on Russia instead. We're surely on more solid ground here. As Jonathan Wilson (the finest football writer around, I'm beginning to think) pointed out at the weekend , it's with them that the idea of Total Football is most faithfully embodied. Wilson points out that this has at least as much to do with Russia's own sporting tradition as with the fact that their manager is Dutch.

I can't remember the last time I enjoyed a match (in a non-partisan capacity) as much as Russia-Holland. Sure, Holland appeared relatively sluggish - James Richardson's pun of choice on the Guardian podcast: "Holland Dozier Holland" - but Russia were superlative**. Whenever they had the ball, they looked to score. (The same went for the group decider against Sweden, too.) It didn't matter what the score was at the time. Even when a single goal to the good late in the game, they still went for it. This runs against the prevailing trend which says that possession is merely a means of not conceding a goal. This was glorious anti-anti-football. Most teams would have instinctively shifted their weight onto the back foot and doggedly hoped to protect their lead.

Like England. Good lord, remember how close they came to qualifying - to eliminating Russia? If that thought doesn't send a chill down your spine, you're probably English, in which case you're understandably excused. Think of the difference between the styles of the respective teams. Take England's collapse in Moscow last October: they take the lead and without even thinking, cede two-thirds of the field to Russia, giving up any notion of threatening to score again. They don't even try to control the game by maintaining possession, keeping Russia at arm's length. I would call it 'panic', but that just makes it sound like a reflex rather than the neurosis it probably is. Sometimes it works (cf. the win against Argentina in 2002). This time it didn't.

While we're dragging the party down, let's recall how our hopes are continually elevated and then callously thrown out of the fifteenth-floor window at these major championships. As well as Holland this time, I can think of Argentina in 2006, Anyone But Greece in 2004, Holland in 2000 and, um, Holland in 1998. And Spain, anytime. Yet here I am getting giddy at another bunch of teasers on the basis of a couple of games. The rational course of action would be to pre-emptively adopt the crash position and brace oneself for the inevitable.

Well, luckily, I'm human and therefore inherently stupid. So I hope...no, no, fearlessly predict that: Hiddink will figure out how to counteract the counter-attack of the Spanish; we get a fantastic game between two of the most technically accomplished teams around, with Russia winning; they will then overcome Germany with a wave of almost ideologically attack-minded football; pundits all over the world will not decry Russia's "naivety" and won't say "if only they didn't go for a second goal"; Andrei Arshavin's tournament will be hailed as the greatest since Roberto Baggio in 1994; and I won't be stood forlornly on the pier on Monday morning, clutching an engagement ring in my fist before chucking it into the ocean.

Photo by Georgio R. (away for a while) on flickr

*It's one thing being an intellectual pygmy; imagine being a pseudo-intellectual pygmy.

**'Superlative' being the superlative of choice when one can't think of an actual superlative to say.

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