India and England- A tale of similar woes

Whenever I see the Indian cricket team play I somehow get reminded of the "great" English Football team. For a start, the English FA and BCCI are the richest boards in their respective games. Added to that, the tabloid press and media do tend to hype the respective players. Sample this, the hair-style of Dhoni and Beckham (in the last World Cup) is a major talking point. Similarly, the dressing room chats and politics are also a major revenue boosters for the "news" channels.

I have often felt that these teams are more of "blowing smoke" than actually "lighting fire". Take the records of these teams in major international competition i.e., their respective world cups and additionally also the Euro for the English team. It is, in fact, very mediocre.
I just cannot digest the fact that the so-called punters refer to the English football team as a heavy weight in European football. England, for the record, have actually only won the world cup once and that too on home soil. They could not even enter the final of Euro even once. Their best result in a Euro thus far has been the semi-final defeat to Germany at the Wembley. Additionally, whenever a world cup is round the corner the talk always goes back to the "tactics" used by 1966 team manager-Alf Ramsey or the "leadership skill" of Bobby Charlton. The comparisons are also conveniently drawn and the only difference is in the end result-England are always eliminated at most times before the semi-finals. Note that England did not even qualify for the 1974,78 and 94 world cups.

It is very scary when a similar line of comparison can be drawn with the the Men in Blue. India, like England, won the world cup only once. Experts (particularly the windies experts who appear in the trap box) do feel that the victory against the Windies was lucky. Similarly, England won the 1966 WC with a controversial and a lucky goal from Geoff Hurst. Subsequently, it took India 20 years to make it to the finals. In the mean-time India hosted the world cup 2 times and each time India could only manage at best a semi-final berth. Considering that the amount of competition prevalent is significantly lesser as compared to other games one would expect at least a better performance from the Indian cricket team. Similar to the English media, the Indian media also always draws a comparison with the 1983 squad whenever the WC is round the corner.

It becomes even scarier when one considers that the English football team's best chance to win a silver-ware came in the 2002 WC and 2004 Euro, similar to the Indian cricket team. England did play very well and I felt they were a bit unlucky against the Portugese in Euro 2004 while fatigue got the better of the English team in the 2002 WC. Note that other teams like France, Argentina, and even the eventual winners Brazil were also affected by the insane and early world cup schedule.
However, a case can also be made of the 1990 English team. I guess it was one of the best English team to never win any intl silver ware. Gazza was wonderful in that world cup and Lineker as usual was sharp in the box. However, they lost very heartbreakingly in penalty shootouts to Germany with Gazza missing the fourth penalty.
Similarly India's best chance in the cricket world cup was in 2003. It was only that the Aussies were too good for the Men in Blue. In other WC's India merely had hope rather than any realistic chance of winning the WC.

The fact that Chappell like his former English counterpart Ericsson is going to part ways immediately after the world cup makes for a perfect world cup "success" for the Indian cricket team.


However, I sincerely do hope that the current Indian team proves me wrong and wins the ICC cricket world cup.