England All Stars

Whilst Rooney returns to Baden Baden with a hop, skip and a jump, spare a thought for French striker Djibril Cissé who has broken his leg just days before the World Cup is due to kick off.  Talk about shitting in someone’s branflakes!  He’s got to be the most unlucky bloke around.

I remember that gruesome match he played against Blackburn in 2004 when he broke his tibia and fibula.  The bottom half of his shin dangled from his leg.  Being a touch squeamish it was all I could do to keep my beer down!  Apparantly a similar sort of thing happened this time round.

For the average bloke on the street playing in the World Cup is a fantasy, a schoolboy dream.  Just imagine how it must feel to get the opportunity to make that dream come true only to have it snatched from you at the eleventh hour.

As the French say… Unlucky!

I’ve got to say that I’m developing a bit of a soft spot for Peter Crouch. For a start, the top half of his face doesn’t really match the bottom half and that’s quite endearing really. Secondly he’s come in to replace Rooney, a pretty tough job by anyone’s reckoning and I always support the underdog. Lastly, and probably quite predictably, I like the way he moves.

Speaking as a girl who recently took part in a dance-off at a barbecue whilst wearing a Brian May wig, stupid dancing is right up there with beer and fags as ingredients for a good night out. Now when I performed my favourite breakdance move I was pissed and I was with my closest friends. Despite that, I still felt a bit of a twat. But Crouch was sober and was being watched by millions of people. Now that takes a thick skin and an ability to take the piss out of yourself. Two qualities that any England footballer should have in spades.

More dancing, Peter! More dancing!!!

Oh, and some more goals too, if that can be arranged!

Is anyone else a bit worried about what’s happening in the England squad?  At first we seemed to be going to Germany with some kind of upside down Christmas tree formation, with Crouch sidelined in favour of Owen as a single striker.  Now it seems that The Swedish One has performed a supercharged handbrake turn round the chicane at Monaco and we’re back to a 4-4-2 formation with Little and Large up front.

So many questions.  Where does that leave Gerrard?  What about Carragher?  Should he have been there in the first place?  Will Aaron Lennon get a look in with Beckham dominant on the right wing?  Will Gary Neville ever smile? 

Who knows?  And that’s the problem.  I know we beat Hungary and that’s a really good thing but this close to the World Cup you’d actually be hoping that we had some kind of solid structure.  Instead it feels like our Sven is still tinkering with the team as if it was some ropey J-Reg Ford Capri he’d won from Frank Butcher in a poker game.

I’m just not feeling settled!

If further proof were needed that Robbie Williams is an absolute wanker then Saturday’s Soccer Aid match furnished it in abundance. Okay, so good on him for raising loads of money for Unicef. Can’t fault the fella there. It’s just that he took the game, and himself, far too fucking seriously.

Robbie clearly worked hard to attract massive names from around the world to take part. Maradona braved the heckling to play and alien lookalike Colina even took himself out of retirement to oversee proceedings.

At half time chilled-out Rud Gullit, manager for the Rest of The World team, made several substitutions and ended up fielding five soccer legends alongside the celebrities rather than the four allowed by the rules (naughty boy). His argument was that you couldn’t ask these legends to fly in from around the globe and not give them at least a half. Fair enough, no?

Oh no. Not for Robbie. When Colina wandered over to run it past the posturing England captain (I know, it’s a fucking joke isn’t it?) Robbie said one word, “No”, before walking away. That’s right, before walking away from Colina himself. I might be forgiven for thinking that with it being a friendly exhibition match to raise money for underprivileged children around the world, Robbie might have done the decent thing and put his astronomical ego to one side for 45 minutes and just got on with it.

Colinaâ??s reaction said it all:

â??He said no!!!â? he mouthed to one of his assistants with a mixture of disbelief and derision written across his face.

Robbie, you are in my very considered opinion, a twat. Now fuck off and let us get on with the World Cup!

Iâ??ve been trawling the Internet to find an old Chinese proverb that would roughly translate as â??one broken metatarsal does not a world cup disaster makeâ?. Sadly, no such proverb exists and so Iâ??ve settled on that eastern golden oldie â??A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step,â? or in Rooneyâ??s case, a hobble. I found a few other good ones during my search, starting with another one for Wonderboy Wayne: â??everything has its beauty, but not everyone sees itâ?. And hereâ??s one for the whole team: â??our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fallâ?.

Since thereâ??s no actual football to talk about yet (except for the B Team game, and frankly if embryonic Theo Walcott isnâ??t even in the starting eleven for that then what the fuck is going on?) Iâ??ve been busy setting up my ITV fantasy football team:

GK P Cech (CZE)
GK J Lehmann (GER)

DF G Heinze (ARG)
DF R Carlos (BRA)
DF J Terry (ENG)
DF A Nesta (ITA)
DF K Toure (IVC)

MF P Nedved (CZE)
MF S Gerrard (ENG)
MF C Makelele (FRA)
MF M Essien (GHA)
MF F Ljungberg (SWE)

ST Ronaldinho (BRA)
ST T Henry (FRA)
ST F Totti (ITA)

So these are my Allstars. Reckon you can do better? Or are you scared of being beaten by a girl? Go here and pit your wits (such as they are) against me. Email me your team or put it in the comments box and weâ??ll see who comes out on top.

Thatâ??s all for now.

COME ON ENGLAND