One of my all-time favourite football moments was in 1996 when the German fans (often derided by the English for their lack of sense of humour) sang "football's coming home" whilst winning Euro 96 in England.
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Don't see any problem with 'hating' them as a sporting entity in the forms where tribalism is a bit more prevalent. Despite the Team GB nonsense in 2012 there is no United Kingdom or Great Britain when it comes to (men's) football.
The Premiership's rise has probably diluted this to a lot of younger folk, but at the same time the OTT self promotion of English clubs and brands would only heighten the distaste to others.
The First ever International football match was Scotland v England on 30 November 1872 taking place in Partick.
For football to come home then I guess it’s heading To Partick.
J
What happens if you just want to support someone other than England? No chip on shoulder or anything? Not possible? I’m sure if Scotland were doing well in the competition the whole of England would support Scotland...
Rivalry doesn’t have to be equal, there are plenty teams who are rivals that weren’t/aren’t equal powered clubs or nations. Man City were still a rival of Man Utd when they were pretty poor years back and not even in the same league...
Always like when people get lumped into a “collective” in order to define a negative characteristic - “delusion” and “huge chip on its collective shoulders”. Only chip on my shoulder is because people keep telling me I’ve got a chip on my shoulder...
I’m also picking up from how you have worded your piece that we should all have become Celtic and Rangers fans because logically they outgrew us? Supporting anybody but Celtic and Rangers is just petty and done in a “fleeting” getting back at Celtic and Rangers satisfaction way. Why do Scottish people need to support England in football? Why do English people need to support Scotland in football?
Rivalry in sport is just that, a rivalry. Most are borne out of location, nothing to do with rivals for trophies. You can have rivals in different leagues...
Thanks though, I better get back to the swathe now.
Not true, I’ve personally heard England fans sing, “Are you Scotland in disguise”.
“Cheer up Gordon Strachan, Oh what can it be to fat Scottish ******* with a **** football team”.
Booing of Flower of Scotland (Obviously the favour gets returned with GSTQ).
Don’t be fooled, the true English football fans don’t like us.
J
Errr, Uncles and cousins who have actually said, with the help of a couple of drinks: " I f...ing hate the English" Even calling me " one of them!" because I did not agree with them.
Errr, Scottish youths who I witnessed shouting out during a cinema showing of "Braveheart" "English Ba....rds, wait til we get you outside" to a couple of English students sitting behind them. The students sensibly left early.
Errr, My English wife who was verbally attacked and regularly bullied for being English by a Scottish female work colleague in a government Agency Office in Edinburgh. The matter led to formal disciplinary measures being taken against the offender for discrimination and racism.
Errr, your's truly for not having the same accent ( result of spending my childhood abroad) as a school bully, who called me "English Sc.m" as he laid into me in front of his jeering and cheering mates. I got the better of him, which was some consolation. The headmasters strap soon followed.
Attacking "The English" is widely accepted in social and work situations the length and breadth of Scotland. What a Scot might refer to as "friendly Banter" might be taken as "bullying" and "insulting" by the recipient. Only the recipient has the say in whether it is harmless or not. It is not for the perpetrator to call. Anglophobia is no different to homophobia. It took legislation to outlaw what was deemed so-called "banter" by homophobes.
They've sang about Scotland during at least one match in the last month. We are Englands main rivals. Germany is about as close as England have to a footballing talent related rivalry. I'm sure there's plenty of cities across the world with rival clubs leagues apart whose fans wouldn't like the suggestion that the smaller teams fans should be enjoying the other teams success. If Hearts were in the third division they'd still be our rivals wouldn't they?
In fairness to this debate, the Scotland game would very unlikely be aired in England. If it were, the chances are it would be on a premium service (Sky, BT). Pretty sure there would be people in England that will enjoy sitting in the pub laughing watching Scotland on Sky losing to some country, as I’m sure there will be people in Wales that enjoy the same. We want to watch the World Cup so we get English MOTD coverage of it, it could be argued we’d always be predisposed to care more about England’s games in one way or another simply due to it being broadcasted here on standard TV service.
This again goes back to rivalry, I’d become more indifferent to Hearts if I rarely saw their games and they weren’t in close proximity, that doesn’t mean rivalry doesn’t exist. That’d be an England perspective on it, our game is non-existent to many in England (indifference) but to some it is a nice gimmick, something to laugh at. Scotland’s perspective is more like Hearts being an inferior team to Hibs but Hibs TV being the only immediate coverage they could get of Scottish football. You can bet in the above examples the Hearts fan would view the rivalry bigger than the Hibs fan, if they see a rivalry in the first place.
Imagine Sportscene did the coverage of all major international competitions and that was broadcasted around the UK. Pretty sure there would be a change in mindsets across the land. Rivalry perspectives would change.
Not condoning any of that but are you suggesting no English person speaks badly of Scottish people? Are you suggesting Scottish people have not been bullied in England whilst in workplaces? Scotophobia not as relevant as Anglophobia? You are using phrases that are grouping a nation of people together before making a sweeping negative statement. E.g. “What a Scot”, is that not in itself discriminatory? I call stuff banter that others may cry over, that’s not because I’m “a Scot”. Sorry but that’s like me saying “those English can’t handle their drinks”, bit of banter or am I just pointing out a social phenomenon I’ve experienced first hand?
We all witness different things in our lives, doesn’t make it right and things need to be done but I take offence to what you’ve typed in response to your experiences, I supposedly deeply offend and bully people out of “friendly banter” that only “a Scot” would dish out.
World isn’t perfect, this is a football forum though and we seem to be getting on to topics about political correctness and social issues that are best campaigned for through groups etc. Let’s not suggest all Scottish people are nasty people who cannot distinguish between banter and bullying though.
Whatever I say against the xenophobes and racists in Scotland applies equally to the xenophobes and racists in England.
I do agree with you that the world indeed isn't perfect and this is a "football forum" thread, and not the place to discuss deep and divisive social issues.
Please don't take anything I have posted personally.
On that note I will bid you good night.
If you genuinely believe that, go onto Facebook and read any post over the last 3 weeks on a football related page. I.e MOTD, Football Accumulators, bet365 etc and read the comments. Regardless of the subject it won’t take you long to find someone taking about us sweaty socks in a derogatory fashion.
The first one I’ve definately heard when they were spanking someone gash. It wouldn’t make sense against us.
They don’t like us.
I’m talking real England fans. The fans who totally get why many Scots are ABE. They get the football rivalry. Not my bandwagon jumping wife, for example.
J
So let me get this right. Hibs fans aren't allowed to want hearts to lose games and Scottish people aren't allowed to want England to lose because of stuff that happened over 30/40 years ago to certain posters families. Ok.
If you take the rivalry and pseudo tribalism out of football supporting , it will be a banal sport - I’m all for the “whataboutyou” banter. It’s part of the spark that makes football great - English fans are having a field day on social
Media just now - good luck to them
Hoping “itisnaecominghome” is trending tonight [emoji2][emoji106]
**** England they aren’t winning it anyway. C’mon CROATIA 🇭🇷
There’s a very good article on the BBC sport website highlighting the pain and joy of football which contains the following paragraph which takes me right back to that glorious day 2 years ago when SDG’s header hit the back of the net in injury time:
’You also know what football can do for you. It makes you leap around and grab your friends around the neck and roar at each other's faces from inches away. It makes you jump on the back of strangers. It makes you feel the same way at exactly the same time as millions of people you will never meet.’
Maybe not millions but certainly many thousands felt the same as me that day......
Well I'm firmly in the 'I want England to win' camp, and have been since the group matches. I'm watching the games with mainly English friends and it's been really good fun. I actually really like this squad, the inclusion of an Ashley Cole or a John Terry type would have changed my perceptions really. I'd like them to do it for my mates and I think they've been a good 'team'. I like that in a squad. As I've said before, I've absolutely had my ABE days but now? Due to a variety of political things, I'm actually enjoying not getting involved in a polarised and, at times quite parochial, debate on all things Scottish. Don't have a problem with others doing that, personally, I'm just sick of it.
It's important to my friends and therefore it's important to me. I'll even admit that I actually cheered on Hearts back in their 2013 League Cup challenge. I actually wanted them to win that game because my friend's Hearts supporting father came back from one early round and had a heart attack in the car and died. Seemed like a fitting way for him to be remembered.
England winning would make my mates happy and, in the absence of Scotland, I'll happily take that as a nice outcome for me.
Most Scottish football fans have been subject to derision and experienced an overall contempt from English football fans (and media) when it comes to Scottish football and it's standard , despite most of them not having much ,if any, knowledge of the game up here.
It's hardly surprising that the same Scottish fans would would want to see the English national team lose.
There does seem to be a lot of overstating how good they are here. “If we play like we did vs Sweden we will progress comfortably.” IMO if they play like they did against Sweden they’ll get humped. Croatia are actually equal to (or better than) England in overall squad quality, and they can’t simply rely on Pickford to make a string of wonder saves again.
A friend of mines brother who is Northern Irish, but lived most of his life in Scotland has pretty much written where I would stand in all this in this blog on the subject debated on this thread.
http://bloodandporridge.co.uk/wp/?p=9092