From Nice humiliation to Wembley final: following England’s Euro rise | Philip Cornwall
10-Jul-2021 15:00:19 | Guardian
I watched England’s decades of underachievement marred by menace, capped by 2016’s Iceland defeat. I’m glad I kept going
As I walk down Olympic Way from Wembley Park tube station on Sunday night, in hope though not expectation, I will think Nice thoughts. About complacency, about comedy, and above all the near-agony of the miles-long trudge away from that French city’s stadium on gout-scarred feet after watching England exit the last European Championship.
On 27 June 2016, the national team took decades of underachievement to depths beyond contemplation, losing to an Iceland team in their country’s first major finals, drawing from a population of about 350,000. Or about the aggregate attendance at Premier League matches across a single pre-pandemic weekend.
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