Keeping things in perspective

A deflated England football on the front page of the Sun and how this marks the end of England as a world power. They're right all across the world people are turning to one another and saying "You know I used to think of England as a world power, but since they failed to qualify in the European League I don't know anymore". Reports are in that Iraqis are calling our troops losers and newspapers headlines read "How can you bring stability here when you can't even win a football match?" and the Falkland Islands are in talks with Argentina about switching nationality out of sheer embarrassment.

Talks about trying the manager for treason are afoot, with one person mentioning that he shouldn't get a trial just be put up against a wall and shot - the people have spoken. The Express wonders if we lost as the players were thinking about Madeleine too much, and the Mail produces a nice graph showing football losses plotted against house prices.*

In fact the only celebrations going on are in Number 10 where Brown and Darling are raising a glass to "New headlines".

You know a cynic might wonder if the news of HMRC misplacing the personal data of millions of people was timed to coincide with the qualifying match. After all if we'd won the papers would be full of praise for our boys, if (when) we lost they'd be full of bile. In either case data loss would not be on the front page not today, not tomorrow and I doubt over the weekend; by which time it might have all be forgotten.

It's football, in the greater scheme of things it doesn't even register. But no dump the scandal of a government department failing in basic security measures and plaster pictures of overpaid 'stars' on the front page (and inside pages) instead. Gods we get what we deserve don't we?

*For the humour impaired I'm joking (apart from the Sun), as was the 'put against a wall" person; sadly I'm sure there are those out there who wouldn't be.