Gazza sectioned....

[Pavilionaire]

The Dutch fans are NOT ok - ask the German fans about them. They really are big ruddy-faced arrogant twats.

Well, if anyone's determined to stick with the hackneyed old "they all HATE us" stuff - it's proved a tried and tested way of justifying xenophobia thrown back at THEM, for example - then fine; I think it sounds quite entertainingly bitter. I'm just saying that every German/French/Swiss football fan I've spoken to about England's failure to qualify for Euro 2008, or German football pundit I've watched thinks it's a massive shame that England aren't there next week, one of them (Gerhard Delling, since you don't ask) shook his head and described their absence as "totally unthinkable".

I wish I still had the link to the NSC thread I started prior to the 2006 world cup that had an opinion poll of Germany fans who said that if Germany weren't going to win it, the team they'd otherwise prefer to win it was actually...wait for it...England - all of which seems a slightly unusual form of hatred to me; I can't quite imagine that particular weltanschauung will have changed much in the last two years. But...whatever.

I've been to WC98, WC06, Euro00 and Euro04. I've seen England vs Germany and Holland vs Germany, along with every other major European team. I have great respect for the German fans because although they were in the minority they outsung the Dutch in the stadium - mainly because the Dutch were by that stage partied out.

Generally speaking, the further south you go the more they hate England. You can pretend things have moved on but they haven't.

And why would any neutral fan want England to do well when they can support the enlightened football of Holland or Portugal? What is there to like about Lampard, Rooney, Ashley Cole, Terry or Ferdinand? Our football under McLaren was appalling, which is why we're not there.