England and Scotland will both compete in a men’s World Cup this month for the first time this century. For both nations there are reasons to believe
The agonising climax to Saturday’s men’s Champions League final in Budapest will haunt the imaginations of Arsenal supporters for years to come. Penalty shootouts – a sporting version of Russian roulette – are a brutal way to lose a football match, with hope turning to despair in the time that it takes to fire a ball over a crossbar. The England men’s team, of course, used to know this only too well, famously leading Gareth Southgate to use a psychologist to address players’ nerves.
A triumphant Sunday parade allowed the Premier League champions to reflect on what they did achieve, rather than what they didn’t. There was further consolation in the presence of the Arsenal women’s team bus, as the massed hordes acclaimed their achievement in winning the inaugural Fifa Women’s Champions Cup and reaching the Uefa Champions League semi-final. They remain the only English women’s team to have won the latter.
