England United: Priceless - Have a little faith.

By Michael Lynch
June 6 2004

Originally written by myself for e2004.co.uk, so apologies for the lack of Nottingham Forest relevance. Anyway, does anybody else feel many of our own fans have written of our nations chances in Portugal, already?

^{Have we already written off our own chances of success?  France do have a very good chance this summer, and will certainly provide England with a stern test - but what can you say when your own manager is telling the media your biggest rivals as good as have it in the bag!}

^{Our fans also seem to have written off our chances. Skim read any forum and there are a countless number of posts saying.... "I'd love us to go the distance, but this is something that the French will win." Maybe they do have Vieira, Henry and Zidane (the best players in the world) - and yes,  on paper, they do boast more ability than Sven's men - but why the lack of faith in our boys?}

^{World Cup 2002. France failed to get past the group stages. We all expected them to produce the goods, but their World Class Squad just didn't deliver. All the emphasis from Sven and Captain Magnificent is on Team Spirit. Something we are told we have in abundance - something the French are often criticised for not having enough of.} 

^{Let us not forget who they beat in order to qualify. Cyprus, Slovenia, Malta and Israel. Not really World Class opposition are they?. So they won every game? That doesn't mean they'll walk all over everyone in Portugal.} 

^{Okay, so maybe i'm lying, maybe I do tip France to beat us next weekend. Yes, maybe I do think they'll brush aside Europe's finest - But i'm not going to go around saying that am I?.  I certainly wouldn't if I was Sven. Maybe the England Manager should believe in his side?}

^{So let's all get behind the Three Lions, take a lesson from the Americans and be little more patriotic, (but not to the extent where we all become stark, raving jingoists ! )This is the chance to unite a nation. This could prove to be this generations 66'. If we can learn something from the French it's that Football can unite a multi-racial society. So if we're going to build them up for anything - let it be that.}