World Cup Diary 24. Postscript.

There are a lot of people in world football, and in and around the game in England, who will be pleased to see this England team go out of another major championship.

England play the beautiful game the way it was meant to be played - with honesty and dignity.

There is a nasty unpleasant side to football and Portugal and Scolari are only average in their nastiness, and what we call cheating they think of as smart play.

There is nothing you can do about it - Portugal were never a match for England, not even with an extra man. There are people who admire Brazils seciond half performance against England in Japan, to others it was woeful cynical timewasting. When you lose, you lose.

For all the appalling refereeing, and for all the diving and wrongness and all the rest - the prize has been taken away. A good friend said they would never let England win it - they are scared because its our game. And our game is different - a mans game played hard and fair. And our suporters are different - passionate and involved and close to the team.

The World Cup will go on. The Germans will carry on wishing they were English and the circus of cheats, divers and referee pressurising will go on and on. They won't have the white shirts of England and they won't have the mass support that electrifies the stadiums.

They can have their corruption scandals in their Italian and German courtrooms and they can have games where successful play is getting the opposition talent sent off. They can have all of that and they can have mass brawls when they don't how to lose.

England have pride and the beautiful game and we know you'll never walk alone. Come on England.

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