England World Cup KO "Shock"

Hate to be a smart-arse but I predicted (on record) that England would not get out of their group; they would be on the wrong end of some suspicious officiating; Suarez would do them in the Uruguay game. FIFA ranked England third in Group D which, pending the outcome of the Costa Rica dead rubber, is just about right. One of the few instances FIFA have pronounced on anything correctly.

We'll deal with the racist-abusing, biting, diving Suarez another day. Meanwhile let's look at some facts. This, everybody needs reminding, is a WINTER WORLD CUP. Sure, the equatorial cities are fairly constant in climate all year round, but the southern ones like São Paulo, Porto Alegre, even Rio, can get quite chilly. The FA placed much emphasis on conditions in Manuas. São Paulo, however, was cold, wet and not too far over the border from Uruguay, making it a home game for them with native weather to boot. Uruguay, apparently, didn't base themselves in Brazil but had remained in Montevideo up to this point, doing no tropical acclimatisation, which may account for their failure against Costa Rica in Fortaleza. They were also without Suarez. One likes to think the FA took all this into account in their intelligence-gathering. But you do wonder.

Coast Rica are good, make no mistake about it. They have a solid bunch of MLS players. Football in the US should not be underestimated. Given their victory over Italy, does England's heroic failure against the latter now say more about the Italians than it does about us?

With regard to Roy Hodgson, he seems a decent bloke whom the players like. I don't see he could have done much better with the players at his disposal. Although, as blogged previously, he should have taken Ashley Cole and, given the right circumstances, John Terry. I find it wryly amusing that poor old Roy, absolutely battered for his previous caution and preference for 4-4-2 (the formula which got England, solidly if unremarkably, to Brazil), is now being hauled across the coals for opting for youth and flair, the very thing the media was salivating over up until... er... about 10pm Thursday.

Bottom line is, England simply haven't got the players. How many would have got into the Italy or Uruguay teams on their performance in the tournament? How many English players play in the top technical club leagues — i.e. Spain, Italy and Germany? Answer: none. The only British player playing at top Continental level is Gareth Bale. Our players simply do not have the technical ability. In fact we don't even play football in this country — not the sport that other countries excel at. It looks the same, sounds the same, feels the same, smells the same. But it isn't the same. Until we start playing that game, Chris Waddle will continue with his quadrennial radio rant.

And finally, a tactical point. People talk about systems. Terry Venables said it's never about the system, it's about the players, which is probably true. But here's a thing... in the only two tournaments in the last quarter century in which England gave a decent account of themselves — 1990 and 1996 — the team played with three centre backs and two wing backs, the 5-3-2 or 3-5-2 system, depending on which way you look at it.

Before we get too misty-eyed over 1990, it should be reminded that England stunk that tournament out, too, until a player revolt forced dear old Bobby Robson to switch to 5-3-2. But suddenly, with a solid defensive line and the creative players free to roam, defensive responsibilities devolved, England looked unbeatable (Robson, bless him, still reverted to 4-4-2 in the last part of a game, just to show who was boss). Even Graham Taylor in his first few games, when he persisted with this system, looked, fleetingly, like he had a world class team. The same applied after early lukewarmness in Euro '96 when Venables adapted his "Christmas tree". And then came Glenn Hoddle. England didn't go far in 1998, but luck played a part in that. When Hoddle used wing backs, England looked impressive, too.

Football's moved on, you say. Stop harking back. I only mention it because the Dutch are currently employing this method.

Brazil Win World Cup: Official

So there we go, one game into the tournament and it's all over. The World Cup is finished. Feel absolutely sickened but not in the slightest bit surprised. Did anyone honestly expect FIFA not to instruct referees to ensure matches yield the "correct" result. Brazil 3 Croatia 1 was a travesty, but then no one — not the Brazilian Govt., not FIFA (nor one, would add, the CIA), can afford anything other than a Brazilian victory. Not with the stability of a continent at stake.

Though, jokingly, ITV's pundits warrant shooting on a regular basis, the sight of those bullet holes in the studio glass was chilling. I wrote about the entanglement of Latin American politics and football in my book Back Home (plundered, uncredited, by The Guardian in a piece about Mexico '70 on Monday). Nada ha cambiado.

And watch out for Saturday night and the referee's embodiment of FIFA's animus towards the English FA.

Rik Mayall

Sad to hear about Rik Mayall. For a student in the early '80s — living in a rancid flat and with a lifestyle and flatmates not dissimilar in aspect to those portrayed in The Young Ones — he was a comic god. Indeed, when The Young Ones went on tour and played my university at the height of their fame in, I think, 1983, it provoked a Beatlemania-esque frenzy.

I remember Ade Edmondson kicking off the show with Adrian Bastard and his Talking Penis (yep, he whipped the old fella out) and Neil (Nigel Planer) emerging from a wardrobe at the back of the stage after about half an hour, which he'd clearly been sitting in the whole time. Though it was Mayall who was the undoubted star.

Much has been written about The Young Ones and Blackadder, with very good reason. Kevin Turvey, too. But in between those, Bottom and Alan B'Stard, one show has been overlooked, Filthy, Rich & Catflap. It was sorely underrated. I kid you not, I hear the odd Mayall line in my head from that on a near daily basis. Comedy gold.

Wind back earlier and here's a clip of the first time I ever saw Mayall on telly, an early incarnation of the angry people's poet reading his composition "Theatre". Just brilliant...

FIFA Corruption "Shock"!

My goodness... so a multi-billion dollar corporation run by a cabal of elderly men whose votes can bestow ridiculous fortune upon applicants is susceptible to some "inducement" here and there. Who'd have thunk it? Like its ugly sister, the IOC — another body that regards itself as untouchably supranational — FIFA is as bent as bent can be and has been so for decades.

With no disrespect intended to the Brazilian hosts of the impending jamboree, the time to register a protest is NOW, refusing to allow one's national team to participate. But that's never going to happen, is it? And for the all the high-mindedness about investigation and reform, we all know that the inevitable whitewash of FIFA will result in any punitive action being token.

A boycott of Qatar 2022 (which won't happen either) could, potentially, yield a rather tasty prospect — a rogue, breakaway summer tournament, perhaps a more compact competition of 16 teams. But... nope... so petrified are the member associations of being blackballed by Blatter Inc. — even still —that they'll all kowtow eventually.

The biggest losers here will be England. With FIFA unable to disassociate a free press from the will of a government, and, by extension, its FA, the recent Sunday Times uncoverings will be seen merely as a case of sour grapes for failing to win the 2018 bid. In my mind there is no coincidence between the British press' last anti-FIFA rumblings and the denial of Frank Lampard's goal against Germany in South Africa (at a crucial point in the game, remember, when England were on the up). So brace yourself for that dodgy Suarez dive/handball and penalty to Uruguay.

You think FIFA can't determine what goes on on the pitch? 1978: Argentina 6 Peru 0, anyone? (One from any number of historic "arrangements".) As Gabriele Marcotti put it four years ago with regard to England: "And you wonder why results go against you?"

England World Cup Squad 2014

Given the limited pool of English-born players in the Premier League, the make-up of the England squad holds few surprises. As I'm sure for many, the inclusion of a number of young players is a heartening thing, coupled with the more sober expectations this time round.

One thing, though... I do think it is a mistake not taking Ashley Cole. The question should not be over the excessive coverage for the left-back slot but in terms of the contingent of defensive players generally — yet another example of the rigidity of English thinking. Great backs can play anywhere along the line. Great coaches deploy their troops accordingly (Venables played David Platt at right back in Euro 96). Quality full-backs should be inter-changeable, left and right, especially given the preference by some teams to place wide players on the "wrong" flank these days, inviting "inside" rather than "outside" play. 

Cole was out of favour much of the season at Chelsea (a personal bit of point-scoring by Mourinho, one suspects) but had a great finish and is still one of the best. Real Madrid do not chase 33-year-old players for nothing. I can't say I would look forward to an evening out on the town with John Terry but he's still probably the top English centre-back around, too. Throw him into the mix and you'd have a back line featuring three players from the same club — Cahill, Cole, Terry. This surely wouldn't have been a bad thing?

So... Manchester City won the league. Could have told you that in August. See my article for the late Word magazine below. League position correlates directly to the size of a club's player wage bill. And does so with rare exception.

http://jeffdawsonblog.blogspot.co.uk/2011/11/moneyball.html

Anwar Brett

I didn't realise, till watching the BAFTAs last night, that a film journalist colleague of mine, Anwar Brett, had recently passed away. Anwar was a fixture of the junket/press conference scene and chaired quite a few Q&As. A real old-school film lover, he was a regarded critic for local and national press. I didn't know him well but he was super-friendly and a genuinely nice chap. I had no idea he was ill. I thought the BAFTA mention — up there among the Hollywood A-listers — was a classy touch.

Mission Impossible

Lone Survivor, the tale of outgunned Americans on the run in Afghanistan, is now a hit film. Culture meets the one who got away

Jeff Dawson Sunday Times Culture, 26 January 2014

In Marcus Luttrell’s 2007 bestseller, Lone Survivor, an account of his time as a US Navy Seal in Afghanistan, the author makes no bones over what held the biggest fear for him — not the Taliban, not death, but “the liberal media back in the USA”.

On the fateful day of June 28, 2005, Luttrell had been dropped into the Hindu Kush mountains as part of a four-man reconnaissance squad, its mission — Operation Red Wings — to confirm the presence of Ahmad Shah, an al-Qaeda big-beard reportedly holed up in a remote Taliban camp. While on stakeout, high on the frosty slopes, the Seals were stumbled upon by a trio of unarmed goatherds supplying the encampment. Knowing that these men would probably reveal their position, they took them captive and kicked around the moral conundrum.

“The military decision was clear,” Luttrell says. “These guys could not leave there alive.” Yet it wasn’t the Geneva Convention that prompted the Seals to turn the men loose, it was how “termination” might play on CNN. “I suddenly flashed on the prospect of many years in a civilian jail alongside murderers and rapists.”

The Seals knew they had signed their death warrant. Sure enough, the goatherds bounded down to alert the Taliban. Outnumbered 10 to 1 by hardened, AK-47-toting insurgents, the Seals were engaged in a firefight to the bitter end. Petty Officer Luttrell has a message for the powers that be: “If you don’t want to get into a war where things go wrong, where the wrong people sometimes get killed, then stay the hell out of it in the first place.”

In the flesh, this farm boy from Texas is not what you expect of a decorated American war hero: a big, lumbering chap with an off-duty goatee, rumpled hair and full-sleeve tattoos snaking down from under his sports T-shirt. He wears shapeless old jeans and battered trainers. As he shuffles into the chichi New York hotel room, he fixes you with dark, cautious eyes, the polite yes-sirs and Bible Belt reserve incongruous in Manhattan. As if to ease his discomfort, he has brought along his golden labrador, Mr Rigby.

Luttrell backtracks a bit on the book’s rhetoric. It’s been misinterpreted. “I’m not a political person. I’m a middle-of-the-road kind of guy,” he insists. It’s just, once politicians have ceded a situation to the military, they should “step out of the way and let us do our job”.

That Luttrell is here is a miracle. Shot numerous times, with a broken pelvis and vertebrae, and shrapnel wounds to his legs, he tumbled down a mountainside, acquainting himself with every conifer and rock en route. Three hours later, already assumed dead by his superiors, he packed dirt into his wounds to stem the bleeding, crawled seven miles to a stream and waited for the Taliban and a videotaped blade to the neck.

Mercifully, he was discovered by Pashtun tribesmen, including Mohammad Gulab, the local police chief and son of the village elder. Under the ancient code of lokhay, the Pashtun were compelled to take in a wounded warrior of any persuasion, no matter that it would — and did — bring the wrath of the Taliban upon them. Six days on, shunted around hiding places, Luttrell was sneaked to US Army Rangers.

For his bravery, he was awarded the Navy Cross, as were, posthumously, his colleagues Danny Dietz and Matt Axelson. His ranking officer and best pal, Mike Murphy, earned a posthumous Medal of Honor, the highest US military decoration. Luttrell’s gong hangs heavily. A Chinook helicopter with 16 backup troops had been downed by a rocket-propelled grenade, killing all on board, which made Operation Red Wings one of America's worst special-ops disasters since the Second World War. Luttrell’s book was his tribute to the fallen.

To the memorial, you can add the film version. Directed and written by Peter Berg, Lone Survivor stars Mark Wahlberg as Luttrell and Taylor Kitsch as Murphy. “They did a good job of capturing the essence of what went down on the mountain that day,” Luttrell says, though he stresses that some of what happened is still classified. But what possessed him to get into bed with Hollywood?

It turns out Berg had earned his stripes, embedding himself with a Seals platoon in Iraq for a month, doing all the necessary spadework, much as he had done for his previous war-on-terror flick, The Kingdom. Knowing the families were all going to see this film, we wanted to get it right,” Berg says. “These men go and fight because they’re told to by people they don’t know in Washington DC or Nato or the UN, and we don’t really have an opportunity to understand what that means. We need to honour not only the men who died, but the seriousness of sending men to war.”

Lone Survivor has been a runaway hit in the US. In its backs-against-the-wall action, bullets don’t eviscerate, but sting and zap like a plague of incendiary mosquitos, death by a thousand titanium-tipped cuts.

Berg has done away with the first half of the book and cut to the action, as the Seals crawl through the spectacular verdant slopes of the Hindu Kush (actually New Mexico). From the ominous vibe that descends to the satellite phone not working and their only means of summoning rescue being an ordinary mobile phone, you know it ain’t good. Crucially and fatally, that phone call can only be made from exposed high ground (for which Murphy sacrificed himself). With the encircling foe taking pops at will, the film has the feel of an old-fashioned western — as Luttrell puts it, “Little Bighorn with turbans”.

He returned to service, but was eventually invalided out. It’s no secret that he found civilian life a struggle. (He has a twin brother who is still a Seal.) When Berg met him, he was a classic example of survivor’s guilt, wallowing at home, his house a shrine to his brethren. He’s married now, happy, with three kids. “I lost my team-mates, families lost a son — but the way we look at it is, they died a good death, a soldier’s death, and you can’t ask for anything more honourable than that.”

That other hero, Gulab, who told the Taliban where to stick it, has visited the Luttrell ranch near Houston. Back home, though, his family has been forced into hiding. Eight years on, Luttrell is still trying to secure him a green card.