HAVING failed to win a World Cup since 1966, today in 2000 England proved that they could not even win the contest to host the tournament. Not only that, but England’s bogey side Germany were again the nation to beat them, when they won the bid process.

It was on this day that England’s bid to host the 2006 competition came to a grinding halt when they were eliminated in the second round of voting at a meeting of the FIFA delegates in Zurich.

Word on the football streets was that England had reneged on a gentleman’s agreement with Germany that would see the Germans support England’s bid for Euro 96 if England would do the same for Germany’s 2006 World Cup bid.

England’s bid, launched in 1997, was based on the success of Euro 96 and the fact that there was nowhere in the world with better stadia and fans. World Cup winner Sir Bobby Charlton was roped in to head up the bid but there were warning signs as early as 1998 that the old hooliganism problem could scupper the whole thing, when some England fans rioted in Marseille during the World Cup.

Despite Tony Blair jumping on the bandwagon and throwing his weight behind the bid, England were struggling to woo the people with the power with Uefa and even two Scottish MPs coming out in support of the German bid. Further damage was caused when English fans rioted in Charleroi at Euro 2000 and things were looking bleak.



When the decision was announced World Cup winner George Cohen said: “I thought our presentation was absolutely superb. We have been called arrogant, but I cannot think of anyone less arrogant than Bobby Charlton.

“I just think it is a huge amount of politicking going on. Unfortunately we are not represented in Uefa or Fifa. We should be represented, we are a huge footballing nation. It is absurd.

“There may be a lot of anti-British bias. This is a humiliation for us, I think our bid was superb.

“Our campaign cost £10m but if we had won this it was worth hundreds of millions to us.”

Then sports minister Kate Hoey said the bid was doomed from the start. “There’s a problem if you start off the bidding process and you haven’t even got the support of your own region,” she said.

Let’s hope lessons have been learned as the 2018 tournament is the new target for an England bid. We’re not putting any money on England picking up that one either…

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