Way back in the first year of TFK we managed to compile 1,966 reasons why we were hoping England wouldn’t win the World Cup. It worked spectacularly and without our little contribution to the gods we’ll never know what disaster lay in wait.
So let’s go for it again.
Number each reason.
No duplicates.
I’ll start us off with:
- the BBC
- ITV
- Sky Sports
- Rule Brittania
- Her Majesty
- Prince Charles
- William
- Harry
- Anne
- Philip
- The BNP
- The Tory Party
- New Labour
- Eurosceptics
- cockneys
- Football’s Coming Home
- The Lightning Seeds
- The Lighthouse Family
- Paul Gascoigne
- The Fog on the Tyne
- Sir Clive Woodward
- Jimmy Hill
- Jimmy Hill’s Sunday Supplement
- The Commonwealth Games
- The 6 Counties
- Jealousy
- The EPL
- The British Empire
- Oliver Cromwell
- Bloody Sunday
- Dublin and Monaghan bombings
- John Terry
- Fiddling MP expenses
- Paula Radcliffe
- Seb Coe
- London 2012
- The Millennium Dome
- The London Eye
- Henman Hill
- SW17
- Albert Square
- Coronation Street
- Sellafield
- Rockall
- Not learning how to say “McGrath” or “Moran” or “Kinsella” properly
- The War on Iraq
- The War on Terror
- Xenophobia (their xenophobia, not my distaste for all things English)
- Mock Tudor houses
- Stonehenge – give me Newgrange any day
- The Daily Telegraph
- The Daily Mail
- Tony Martin
- Ellen MacArthur
- Blackpool Tower
- Knighthoods
- Strongbow
- Sir Charles Edward Trevelyan
- The Corn Laws
- Diana
- Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps
- Allo Allo
- The Proms
- The Boat Race
- Arrogance
- Polo
- Gibraltar
- The Sun
- The Mirror
- West Midlands Police
- The Full Monty
- Geoff Hoon
- Gina G
- Gary Lineker
- Jamie Oliver
- Jack Russell
- Chelsea
- Ken Bates
- Big Brother
- Pop Idol
- Men and Motors
- Nuts
- Mary Poppins
- Stag parties
- David Cameron
- Peter Stringfellow
- Toad in the hole
- Sven
- The FA
- Ray Wilkins
- Terry Butcher
- David Platt
- Chris Boardman
- Chris Boardman’s bike
- The Isle of Wight
- Little Britain
- Essex
- Enid Blyton
- Kingstown
- Queenstown
- King’s County
- Queen’s County
- Kingsbridge Station
- B & Q
- Halfords
- Camilla
- William Pitt
- The FA Cup
- The Famine
- Creamfields
- Coldplay
- Keane (the band)
- Nick Faldo
- Elton John
- Winston Churchill
- Cliff Richards
- Cliff Richards’ Celebrity Tennis
- Jimmy Five Bellies
- Michael Carroll – King of Chavs
- Chavs
- ASBOs
- Morris dancing
- Richard and Judy
- Punch and Judy
- Three Lions
- English Rose
- Jane Austen
- Austin Healey
- The Normans
- Frank Lampard
- Woolworths
- Hugh Grant
- Recent episodes of A Question of Sport
- Simon Cowell
- The City
- Getting cheap immigrant labour to pick c0ckles
- Swing Low Sweet Chariot
- Land of Hope and Gloy
- Dambusters
- God Save the Queen
- Cup Final Hymns
- Songs of Praise
- Through the Keyhole (a decent concept for a gameshow but the “celebrity” in question was never famous)
- Magners instead of Bulmers
- Mr Blobby
- Emile Heskey
- All Bar One
- Stansted Airport