England
I’m sick of pretending to be Irish
The French socialist must have burst her bladder getting a litre of percolator coffee down her to stop the Dutch…
Will my French guests get revenge for Agincourt?
The French couple did not speak much English so I rattled on in my best French, thinking I was doing…
Don’t feel sorry for Argentina
It keeps on happening, the passing of sporting titans. First Garfield Sobers and now Kevin Keegan, a couple of the…
Americans, do your duty: support England
Soccer is not a quintessentially American sport. Just as Brazil is forever the country of tomorrow, soccer is always the…
England and Norway should unite
Tonight, Erling Haaland and Harry Kane should be playing together, not against each other. Partially because Haaland is a Yorkshireman,…
Thank God for Thomas Tuchel
Here’s an interesting question: had Thomas Tuchel been Portugal’s manager rather than England’s, would he have picked Cristiano Ronaldo to…
America is still an English country
Americans have been enjoined, as we approach our country’s 250th anniversary, to be a bit more grateful. Good advice. It…
The citizens of nowhere adrift in the West
Threatened with violence in her native Turkey, the writer Ece Temelkuran finds herself, like countless migrants, permanently ‘unhomed’
The conservatism of Tom Stoppard
Sir Tom Stoppard, who died last week, never wrote a memoir, but he did sort of speak one. Just over…
How to raise a patriot
‘Good news for patriots,’ said one of our most celebrated national newspapers this week: ‘Your numbers are likely to swell.’…
What it means to be English
How can you ever put your finger on the comfort, the joy, the absurdity, of being English? Not, perhaps, through…
The force of Typhoon Tyson, Sydney, 1954
After receiving a bouncer from Ray Lindwall that left him temporarily unconscious, England’s fast bowler Frank Tyson swore vengeance and annihilated the Australian team – to retain the Ashes
Sven-Goran Eriksson was an England great
Sven-Goran Eriksson, who has died aged 76, was an unlikely choice for the England job in 2000. He was inexperienced…
Megan Rapinoe’s comeuppance
I’m loath to write about the current Fifa World Cup because criticising women’s football is textbook ‘misogyny’ – at least,…
Wild life
Delayed, on Southern Rail Home From the Hill is a 1987 documentary by Molly Dineen about Hilary Hook, an elderly…
Why England lost the Ashes
England’s wretched performance in the Ashes – which saw the side lose three tests and so the series to Australia…
The Italians are deluding themselves about the English
Not content with winning Euro 2020, many Italians have spent the days since the final engaged in a febrile orgy…
Britain is a tolerant country and a few football racists don’t change that
The racist messages sent to England football players in recent days are shameful, but to suggest that the UK is a festering hotbed…
Isn’t it time social media cracked down on racism?
No sooner had Bukayo Saka’s penalty kick thudded into the gloves of the Italian goalkeeper than you could see it…
England, Italy and the power of national pride
As an Englishman in enemy territory I am lucky that love is a more powerful emotion than patriotism otherwise after…
Boris’s cunning has allowed him to share in England’s Euro 2020 glory
You campaign in poetry, you govern in prose. That was the formula of legendary New York governor Mario Cuomo and…
Have Southgate’s England lost their moral compass?
Back in the 1980s the BBC Match of the Day opening credits featured a clip of Manchester United winger Mickey…
Taking the knee isn’t the best way of showing black lives matter
As a black football fan who grew up going to matches in the seventies and eighties, I know more than…
Euros 2021: England are easily the most boring side in the tournament
England 0 Scotland 0 Hungary 1 (Fiola) France 1 (Griezmann) The wonderful Hungarians almost took my mind off England’s lamentable…
