English football: Why So Serious?

Toby Martin asks why there are so many long faces in English football

Careful, we might think you're enjoying yourself

Pick an English footballer; any English footballer. Type their name into Google Images and, alongside the long-lens photos of them cavorting with a team-mate’s Peruvian babysitter, you’ll see picture upon picture of serious, stony-faced hard men proving just how seriously they take their profession. Normally they’re doing this in one of three ways:

1. Having just scored in the 94th minute of a match with a 40-yard dipping volley, they will be displaying their emotions by being photographed passionately screaming at their own supporters
2. On international duty, they will be pictured covering up the fact that they don’t know the words to God Save The Queen by staring into the mid-distance, jaw set in stone, face emotionless. This demonstrates just how seriously they are taking the match.
3. When being paid many millions to promote the latest Adidas boot (it looks just like the last one, but has one extra stud), they are captured standing side-on to the camera, arms folded across their chest with a look on their face that says, “If you even so much as think about buying Nike boots, I’m going to break your kneecaps just by looking at them.”

Now, let’s repeat the above exercise but with one key difference. This time we aren’t going to search for pictures of your favourite overpaid English showpony. This time, search for Messi; or Kaka; or even Carlos Tevez. Notice a difference? No, I didn’t mean that Tevez is a lot uglier than the first two. These players seem filled with so much more joy than our serious, dour Englishmen. How often do you see an England international really look like he’s enjoying his football? They go about their work with all the joy of a bunch of men who have just been asked by the Welsh tourist board to prepare a pamphlet entitled The Sexy Side of Port Talbot.

Screaming is the new smiling

Wayne Rooney’s four-letter fudge-up at the weekend wasn’t just the action of a man of limited knowledge and vocabulary, it was representative of just how much anger, seriousness and pent-up rage the man plays with. Not passion; anger. Days later, Peter Crouch costs Spurs dearly by making two ridiculous lunging tackles in the first 15 minutes of their match versus Real Madrid. Harry Redknapp later pointed out how out of character this was, perhaps suggesting that players think it a good idea to approach big matches even more fired-up than usual.

Part of this problem stems from us, the supporters. We constantly demand to see passion from our players, and we hate to think that they don’t care about the team they’re playing for. But somewhere along the line, passion has become confused with anger and seriousness. John Terry scores once in about every 14 games; how the hell does he prevent a massive, broad smile from spreading across his face whenever his forehead thunders the ball into the back of the net? And why on earth would he want to? Whenever Rooney scores, why does Rio Ferdinand always come and stick his clenched fist under the nostrils of the poor fan in the front row, bawling some ethereal, primeval scream into the stands?

Surely there isn’t a fan out there who wouldn’t like to see their team play like they are enjoying their football. It may sound like a slight, insignificant point, but surely a side which wins or loses with smiles is a side with excellent team spirit and a playing style which reflects their mental approach to the game.

Spain plays like a team with a cheeky grin; Brazil plays like a team with a broad beaming smile while England plays like a team with a scowl.