This was the first attempt that the golden generation had at a major tournament. With the likes of Tony Adams and Alan Shearer retiring from international football, it was time for a new breed of talent. The media told us on countless occasions that this was the most gifted group of players to represent England since 1966 and were our best hope for success. We were then all brainwashed into believing that we would win the World Cup. To be fair, we did have a reasonable chance in 2002 the opposition wasn't as strong as it had been in previous years and Sven-Göran Eriksson appeared to know what he was doing, and we beat Germany 5-1 in the qualifiers! After advancing through a very difficult group stage and cruising past Denmark in the last sixteen we were drawn against a Brazilian side that had convincingly won all four of their previous games within the tournament. Eager fans across the country were glued to their TV sets for the untraditional kick off time of 7.30am on a Friday morning - due to an eight hour time difference in host nation, Japan. Michael Owen capitalised on a clumsy defensive error and put us in the lead on the 22nd minute. The dream and reality were intertwining the whole nation suddenly believed we could do it. Sadly we were all sent crashing back down to earth on the stroke of halftime, when a cool Rivaldo finish meant that the teams would be going into the interval all square. The dream was completely squashed early in the second half when David Seaman decided to temporarily give up his goalkeeper duties to instead slot into a sweeper role, which would see him lobbed by a 35-yard Ronaldinho free-kick. The game finished 2-1 to Brazil.
A wrestling enthusiast, currently educating the youth of Taiwan English; there are now a bunch of Asian kids running around with Yorkshire accents. Read about that trip and others at dragonstravel.com.
