The England hype is here.... it’s just a bit late

A fortnight ago, barely anyone knew the World Cup was about to kick off, with the possible exceptions of Gary Lineker and Vladimir Putin. Through the increasing ineptitude of successive England squads, we had happily returned to that blissful state we used to enjoy in the last century, when the tournament existed only for the benefit of those who were interested in football. But as time went on and expectations of the England team grew increasingly demanding and unrealistic, the hype went into overdrive. Every TV advert featured a player doing his best to ‘act’, or a clumsy football reference was shoe-horned somewhere into the narrative. Tabloid newspapers would plaster their front pages with lifesize masks of Frank Lampard or whoever, under the deluded pretext that it would bring us luck in a crucial knockout game. It rarely did.

Now, thanks to England looking quite good (at time of writing) and being far more likeable than in recent years, some sort of delayed hype is descending on us. The flag of St George is re-appearing outside houses and flying from car windows, while pundits are cautiously suggesting - in a way that still sounds like tempting fate - that England can go quite far in the World Cup. By recent standards in major tournaments, I would consider ‘quite far’ to be getting out of the group stages, which England have done already. A triumph in itself to those of us who had written off our chances before a ball was kicked but still not worthy of an open top bus parade, even if a 6-1 win over Panama is as good as it gets in 2018.

Shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry has even tried to curry favour with the football supporting demographic by suggesting there should be a bank holiday if England reach the final. Given it is always held on a Sunday, I’m not sure the policy will prove much of a vote winner under further scrutiny. The annoying phrase ‘dare to dream’ is also being used in pretty much every discussion about England’s chances. People can obviously ‘dream’ as much as they like, I just wish they’d do it quietly.