Is It Wrong To Want England To Lose?

Filed in archive England on March 24, 2007

I swear this has never happened before. Not under Sven, not under Kevin "tactics?" Keegan, not even under Graham Taylor. But for some reason, a small part of me wants England to lose today, just so Steve McClaren can get the sack. Is that wrong?

Of course most of me wants a win. A good win. But a tepid draw, or even a narrow defeat would see England's chances of qualifying for Euro 2008 take another blow, but not a big enough blow for Steve Mac to get the sack. The FA just can't afford to do pay him his severance (which is their own fault for giving him such a large contract, obviously).

But if England took a nasty beating, say 4-1, at the hands of Israel then maybe they'll have no choice. Then maybe someone else, someone with fresh ideas and without an irrational hatred of Gareth Barry can takeover. Someone willing to drop players who aren't performing, no matter their reputation, and someone who will use friendlies to actually experiment as opposed to giving guys like Joey Barton the last 10 minutes, when everything's descended past the point of meaningful competition.

So even though I'd love to see England return to form, and claim a convincing - maybe even entertaining - win over Israel, a small part of me is secretly (or not so secretly given that I've just typed it all out) hoping for defeat.