No fun. But no tears.

It would be nice if we could say it was fun while it lasted, but it really wasn’t. It would be nice if we’d won some new friends while we were there, but no one will miss us. We were a disappointment, an irrelevance and ultimately, an embarrassment. Goodbye England. Goodbye Golden Generation. Good riddance as far as the rest of the World Cup is concerned.

I didn’t cry although I do care. I wasn’t surprised although I was disappointed. I’d love to see England succeed, but like you, I have become conditioned to their failure. I refuse to waste my emotions on the men involved yesterday, but I do worry about those who’ll have to take up the baton tomorrow. I will continue to watch the World Cup and now I can actually enjoy it, without the overwhelming angst that goes with watching the three lions.

Please, please don’t waste your time cursing the lack of goalline technology and convincing yourself that we would have won the match if Frank Lampard had been correctly awarded his goal. That was a moment that embarrassed the World Cup and should humilate world football’s top man Sepp Blatter, who flatly refuses to discuss the issue. But it’s smoke and mirrors as far as England are concerned and if we are to ever move forward we MUST NOT use it as a sticking plaster to cover the problem. We were horribly exposed and totally outplayed yesterday by a nation that doesn’t do golden generations. Germany don’t fete and annoint a group of individuals and then continually forgive their failures and gloss over their weaknesses. Germany constantly renew themselves and make sure they turn up fresh and ready for every major tournament. We just order the suits and hope Lamps and Stevie G will sort it out in the midfield. In terms of organisation and attitude, they make us look like amateurs.

Which is exactly what they did on the pitch yesterday. Their tactics weren’t anything special, they were set up the way most top teams are these days in the Champions League. But they pushed and pulled England’s inflexible formation all over the pitch. We had no answers, in fact it looked as if we didn’t understand the questions.

As a nation we like to find someone to blame. Start with the manager if you must. I was disappointed with Fabio Capello’s handling of this tournament, but I’m not sure that making him the scapegoat is going to help. At least now he understands the scale of the problem. Let him try again. It’s his mess, he’s a decent manager, so why not see if he can fix it. Blame Wayne Rooney for his bafflingly annonymous displays if you want. Blame the defence for being awful yesterday. Blame the midfield for being just plain wrong and unable to cope with Germany’s elegant movement. Blame English Football for putting club before country and milking the cash cow of the premier league at the expense of the national team. Blame the Baby Bentley Generation who have the world handed to them on a plate and as a result cannot possibly understand the concept of responsibility. We can blame ourselves if we like, for the pressure we put on our brave boys with our huge levels of expectation.

Or just don’t bother. Now the bags are packed and the wool has been pulled from the eyes, just how far did we think we’d get with Gareth Barry as holding midfielder ? With Matthew Upson in the team ? Without a proper first choice goalkeeper ? With a centre forward who doesn’t score goals ? With one captain injured, one captain playing out of position on the left and one captain agitating for change and being horribly exposed for his lack of pace ? Our squad wasn’t really very good and nor were any of our performances. We like to think that we are less than the sum of our parts, but are we ? Perhaps that’s the sum total. That’s worth crying about. That’s worth worrying about. It’s what lies ahead that worries me. As the Golden Generation exit the stage, who will replace them and will they be any better ? There may be dark days to come, or maybe, just maybe, we will finally look ourselves in the mirror and decide whether we are serious about these tournaments and whether we are prepared to change things in order to help us succeed.

So there’s lots to talk about. But it can wait. Just sit back and enjoy the REAL football at the rest of this World Cup. It’ll be fun now.