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Dreams
of an England Sports Fan
When the
England cricket team was systematically taken apart
by Australia in the so-called “Battle for
the Ashes” (some battle!) a few weeks back I
remember thinking, that’s it we’ve now
reached rock bottom. How wrong I was. Like many of
you, I’m sure, I watched in horror and disbelief
as our national football team plumbed new depths with
home defeat to the same country earlier this month.
With the obvious exception of rugby union and one or
two others we seem to be worse than useless at virtually
every sport we play these days. It’s all quite
depressing isn’t it?
It wasn’t always this way, though. There have
been some marvellous sporting moments over the years
and I thought I would share some of my favourites with
you. Just to show that I’m not a completely blinkered
sentimental English fool I’ve included a couple
of non-English moments and even one non-human! Here
they are in no particular order -
- Actually,
I’m not quite telling the truth here, this
has got to be near the top of my list. That fantastic
occasion in July 1981 when Ian Botham, assisted
by some devastating bowling by Bob Willis, destroyed
Australia in the Headingley Ashes test. England
were taking a pounding (nothing new there then!)
and even the English bookies were offering 500-1
against an English victory when Mr Botham came
to the crease. He smote the Aussie bowlers all
over the field, played the innings of a lifetime
and in so doing snatched an incredible victory
from the jaws of defeat. It’s a shame we
can’t clone him!
- For
pure sentiment and let’s face it, novelty
value in British tennis, Virginia Wade winning
Wimbledon in the Queen’s Silver Jubilee year
of 1977.
- The
graceful and lightning quick Sebestian Coe winning
the 1980 Olympic 1500 metres final in Los Angeles
after unexpectedly losing the 800 metres final
to his arch-rival and fellow Englishman Steve Ovett.
- The
great, and not many sportsmen or women can be called
this, (but see 9. below) Sir Steve Redgrave winning
his fifth consecutive rowing gold medal in the
2000 Olympics. The greatest ever Olympian?
- The
immaculate Bobby Moore (how sad that he was never
knighted before his untimely death) holding aloft
the Jules Rimet trophy after leading England to
triumph in the world cup final at Wembley. How
can any sports fan lucky enough to be alive in
1966 forget that wonderful day?
- Damon
Hill, in 1996, emulates his late father’s
achievement by becoming Formula One World Champion
driver. An emotional event causing Murray Walker
to cry into his microphone! Mind you, old foot-in-mouth
Murray had been making us cry – with laughter – for
years!
- The
summer of 1981 again – when John McEnroe
avenged his defeat by the legendary Bjorn Borg
in the previous year’s Wimbledon final by
winning the rematch. And what an epic match it
was! Five sets of high class skill and drama. The
Americans regularly do it but how can little Sweden
consistently produce so many talented tennis players
and we can’t. No, don’t get me going
on that one!
- The
American swimmer Mark Spitz winning seven gold
medals in the 1972 Munich Olympics. He was so fast
I could have sworn he was wearing flippers!
- “The
Greatest”, (and he was!) Muhammed Ali, defeats
the fearsome George Foreman in “the Rumble
in the Jungle”, Zaire, in October 1974 to
win back his heavyweight title. The experts gave
Ali no chance following Foreman’s brutal
demolition of Smokin’ Joe Frazier to win
the world title but Ali proved them all wrong – and
in some style.
- April
1977, Red Rum wins The Grand National for the third
time – and in so doing makes a fortune for
the good folk of his hometown, Southport. I doubt
we’ll ever see his like again. I can’t
believe I only backed him once!
Well,
those are ten of the best in my opinion. It’s
all very subjective, I know. For instance how could
I omit Rob Andrew’s dramatic last minute drop
goal knocking Australia out of the rugby world cup
in 1995 or David Beckham’s match winning penalty
against Argentina in last year’s football world
cup? I’m sure that there’ll be other glorious
moments to come. How about Martin Johnson raising the
rugby world cup next November in Sydney following England’s
defeat of Australia in the final? Listen, there’s
no harm in dreaming and besides we can’t always
be as bad as we are now - can we?
JE
Feb 2003
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