Silver Lining For The Golden Generation

RAY HARPER suggests that England’s recent stumbles put former displays into a different context…

AS THE final whistle blew on England's appalling exit to Iceland at the Euros last summer, a number of hard messages came home to English football.

We cannot win knockout tournament matches, or cope with the huge pressure piled on us by ourselves and the media. The quiet but significant outcome of the Iceland match is that the history of the ‘golden generation’ was rewritten.

We have been told that the golden generation (Steven Gerrard, Frank Lampard, John Terry, Ashley Cole, Wayne Rooney, Paul Scholes et al) did not fulfil their potential.

But in the context of recent results, it has become clear that they actually took England beyond their natural limits at tournaments.

Between 2002 and 2006, England reached three consecutive quarter-finals. This feat has never been matched in our history.

During the Sven-Goran Eriksson era, we only lost three competitive fixtures in normal time. These included a last-gasp defeat to a Zidane-inspired France, a loss to eventual world champions Brazil and a defeat in qualifying to Northern Ireland at Windsor Park.

Compared to previous phases in our history, this is impressive. We also emerged successfully from difficult qualifying groups.