The Ultimate Football Thread Watch

England 8 Switzerland 0

During the match build up, Gary Neville is plagued by press rumours he has had an affair with Big Brother political activist and protestor ‘Kitten’. Kitten denies the rumours herself, saying Gary’s militant tendencies and views were a bit aggressive for her (which pi$$es Gary off as he’d started the rumours himself to grab some of the limelight from Beckham).

Sven denies the presence of the team’s wives and girlfriends is breaking the players concentration although he orders Mrs Gerrard, Mrs James and Mrs Heskey not to flash their boobs at their husbands from the stands until the final whistle has gone this time. He also expressly forbids any more mooning from Mrs Beckham from behind the goal particularly when her husband is taking a penalty.

Rio Ferdinand is invited to be TV match co-commentator but fails to show up. Man Utd pay a fortune hiring a top lawyer who insists “Rio caught a plane the very next day and turned up at an empty stadium, which makes everything OK”.

The day gets off to the worst possible start as David James’ positioning is again called into question as he can’t get into the ground until he is told to move along the wall until he can actually see the players entrance.

Switzerland nearly get disqualified for cheating when it appears during the national anthems they are trying to play two goalkeepers. Happily it’s just David James who has positioned himself in the wrong line up.

The Swiss make a nice gesture as they present the England team with a gift of the very latest in computer cuckoo clock technology. As well as going “CUCKOO! CUCKOO!” rather annoyingly at 2 in the morning, the clock also shouts out reminders for the day’s appointments. The England team immediately forward the present to Rio Ferdinand.

Vodaphone plan their latest mobile advert to have Beckham texting reminders about the gameplan and tactics to Heskey in the middle of an important game. The ad will show Emille about to foul an opponent right on the edge of the box when his phone bleeps with the message “Get back on the half way line Emille...DB”. Unfortunately, David send the wrong message from his outbox and Emille’s message reads “Get yer kit off and get on the bonnet of my car…(it’s the red Ferrari in the car park)”. Team morale is not affected by this incident though as David foolishly sends the text in error to Stan Collymore who fortunately enough is hooked up to the internet. Stan immediately books a cheap flight online and leaves excitedly for Portugal.

Top dog walking Stan then plans a celebratory post match ‘bring a camcorder’ party in the car park for the players, their wives and a few of his friends. Media wise party pooper Victoria Beckham advises everyone against attending as she knows all about footballers getting caught with their pants down so the only guests who do turn up for the wife swap are Lee Chapman and a rather nervous Leslie Ash.

Meanwhile Victoria Beckham vows to keep her promise to save her marriage by being closer to husband David in Madrid by house hunting…in Portugal.

After Thierry Henry and Patrick Vierra call England cheats for fouling and kicking the French, it is pointed out that France would not have even equalized without England fouling them. Vierra shrugs and says “vive le difference” while Henry more philosophically says “…………Oh yeah”.

Michael Owen’s anonymous performance against the French is rewarded by another start in an England shirt with Sven pointing out in a TV interview “We must be loyal, show loyalty and we’ll do OK” while in the background two England security officials drag Ledley King kicking and screaming to a waiting airport shuttle bus. Sven interrupts his interview to hurl Ledley’s suitcase onto the bus after him.

Steve Gerrard is determined not to repeat his disastrous back pass but receives a yellow card for when he repeatedly refuses to pass back to James and constantly boots the ball into row Z. The ref explains the reason behind his harsh looking decision is that James needed the ball to take a goal kick.

David Beckham heeds advice to take on lots of water, by taking to the pitch with a hosepipe. When David discovers the hose does not reach a tap, the clever England captain swaps it for two buckets of water. David proves he is not as stupid as he looks by drinking all the water in the first half ensuring his second half performance will not be affected by carrying around two full buckets of water like it did in the first half. David explains later he was not going to get caught out like Rio by not providing water when he was asked.

Prolific goalscoring barrel shaped Wayne Rooney grabs a hat-trick inside the opening 15 minutes and is replaced by Heskey. A grim looking Sven tells Wayne sternly he broke the game plan by not keeping it tight in the first quarter. Emille actually has a good game, does nothing wrong and even stays on his feet throughout. Master tactician Sven appears to have proved his man management and got it through to Emille to simply stand on the half way line and not get involved in defending….. although he later admits to super gluing the soles of Emille’s boots before he went on.

Heskey’s constant selections for England are seemingly explained when an envelope containing photos of Sven and a turnip are found in Emille’s dressing room locker. While Graham Taylor denies any knowledge of the incident, Sven explains they are simply promotional shots for Sven’s latest venture, a video entitled “How to cook a turnip with Sven”. So Heskey’s selection continues to be a baffling mystery, matched perhaps only by the Loch Ness Monster and Heskey’s decision to hack down a French player on the edge of the box with 1 minute to go. Oxford University are given a grant to come up with a scientific explanation for all these phenomena. The boffins decide to solve the easiest one first and head off to Scotland to find Nessie.

After finding enough holes in the Swiss cheese defence to win 8-0 a jubilant and animated Sven enthuses “they did OK, they will do OK in this competition” and shrugs. Sven is then asked to name his most important player and he replies “Larsson, two fantastic goals, we’re gonna win the cup, we’re gonna win the cup, so now your gonna believe us….” Sven explain later his use of ‘them’ and ‘us’ in the wrong order was down to a language problem. “Sorry I don’t speak English” he said before leaving the hotel with the Swedish team for a celebratory party.

Nice

hehe sorry but dream on!
swizerland arent that bad a team!

thats true, but we better not lose it

no i reckon you;l win but not 8-0
probs 2-0 or 3-0 tops!!
we;l have to wait and see

were playing the diamond formation, and scholes at the left well see!

anyone having a bad feeling about this game?

Well, we aren't playing with the diamond.

Hopefully Scholes is fit enough.

Beckham and Owen need to start producing in this game.

May be I could be a pundit because Des Lynam and Terry Venables have just started talking about this on ITV!

yes

i'm sure we'll be ok though

fact: gareth southgate used to go to my school! how exciting!

Ooops it s on ITV! That s not a good sign..

can you get ITV in greece then?

If you have Sky, yes u can.

yay! i'm glad i wore my everton shirt
but i'm scared we are playin **** but then it is england, so we'll probably win

charlton supporter wearing everton shirt *faints*

Beckham and Owen have been better which is good.

Gerrard hasn't done anything.

Rooney has to be careful - needs to be subbed (if he's still on the pitch) on about the 65-70 minute mark.

Lampard also has to be careful - one more booking and he's suspended for Croatia game.

Terry hasn't has the best of games, nor has James.

Campbell has been solid though, and is probably the pick of the bunch so far, along with Beckham's performance.

shut up! i support both

and theaman, gerrard is ace - he's done more than most people. you'll see

Not yet he hasn't.