For all the England Football Fans Out There

Dear Bro,


AAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!


In case you have not heard:

The Skysports Headline:

England bow out with loss

"England failed to get the point they needed to qualify for Euro 2008 despite a stirring second-half fightback as they lost 3-2 to Croatia on a dramatic night at Wembley."


Ever since the advent of the internet and it's never ending instant supply of information I have not only been tortured by poor quality play by the Cincinnati Bengals but am also now subject to constant heartbreak courtesy of the English national team.

Qualifying for the Euro 2008 group required that they play 12 games against 6 teams (home and away) and finish in the top 2 of the group to qualify. Sounds like a tough task right...

Here are the teams in the group and the order they finished:

Croatia - Croatia is actually a very strong team, finishing third in the 1998 World Cup and qualifying for every major tourament since saying "toodles" to the rest of Yugoslavia in 1990. This is the team that won the group.

Russia - a fairly big county, but since the break up of the Soviet Union they have not been a soccer powerhouse by any stretch of the imagination. Rarely every qualify for major tournaments these days.... This is the team that edged out England for the final spot.

England: no comment....

Israel - This country barely has enough room to have a soccer stadium, let alone enough population to field a world class soccer team. Plus, I thought Israel was in the Middle East, not Europe???? They actually have a solid team, but world class.... hardly...

Macedonia: with a population of 2 million and another offshoot of the former Yugoslavia, the main thing Macedonia was famous for was for not getting directly involved in the 1992 Balkans conflict. When you discuss world soccer with knowledgable individuals, Macedonia is not the first team that will be sprouting from their lips....

Estonia: a former Soviet vassal, population 1.3 million... again not a powerhouse in world soccer...

Andorra: ANDORRA... a population of 71 thousand.... I'm not sure if any of this team play for professional teams in Europe....I am getting even more depressed as I type this....



So lets recap... England, a supposed world powerhouse in soccer, missed out on making the Euro 2008 finals because they could not come in second place in a group with the countries listed above....

AAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!