Hubris

You would think the English, of all people, would have taken the principle lesson from Beowulf and that is, of course, to avoid hubris. But they thought it was a done deal after Israel's incredible win over Russia last weekend that they would qualify for EURO 2008 and the discussion turned immediately to "Wow, Steve McLaren is vindicated" and "Ohhh, will Beckham be selected for the tournament?" and nobody considered that, without Terry, Owen, Rooney or humility, the team was surely doomed.

Skybet had the English side as 1/10 favorites to win today, with a 4-1 win given equal odds as a 2-2 draw. Hubris, and I knew I should've taken those bets but we live in a puritan society where betting online is akin to child porn as far as ethics and so on are concerned. Otherwise, I'd be a rich man because I really thought England were dooming themselves to humiliation by being so sure of themselves.

And, they faced massive humiliation. Not only losing, but losing to Croatia. Going down 2-0 in 14 minutes. Coming back to tie, and the thrill and relief that comes with it. Having that utterly devastated just 12 minutes later. Just, completely blowing it. At Wembley. Beckham stuck on 99 caps. I mean. The destruction and embarrassment is almost too much. The English not qualifying for EURO is one thing, but the English not qualifying is such thorough, horrific style. I mean, my God.

Now. There will be some clamoring for the placement of foreign player limits in the Premiership. Or, I guess, there has already been a lot of clamoring and now the clamorers will likely win. This will not raise the level of the English national team, of course, but it is natural and easy to blame their terrible performance on the big bad Africans and South Americans and Eastern Europeans instead of on their own selves. The truth is, not enough English players are good enough to play for the Big Four and probably not even the top 6 or 7 clubs in the Premiership. This is not a flaw of the league, of course, but rather a flaw of England. All a foreign player limit does is lower the quality of football being played in the sport's mother country, by filling the clubs with lesser players who happen to have the right kind of parents. In fact, the top level English players are exceptionally lucky that they have a passage into such a great league simply because of their nationality. Would Frank Lampard really start for Chelsea if he had been born French, or Peruvian or something? I sincerely doubt it.

A bigger idea is to try and send more English players to the leagues on the continent. The concept that a National Team is irrevocably tied to the Domestic Leagues of its country is laughable in today's football. Even Italian players are leaving Italy at this point, and the English should follow.

In a world where a foreigner limit is imposed in England, The Big Four would have to field line-ups with the likes of Gareth Barry, Paul Robinson, James Milner, Dave Kitson. I mean, there's this weird idea that the level of the Premiership is static no matter who plays there. This is just basically, obviously not true. Imposing the limit would not make the English national team any better, but it would definitely make Arsenal, Chelsea, Manchester United, and Liverpool worse.