A night when the ‘Three Lions’ failed to roar, leaving fans heartbroken

Hours earlier than the Euro Cup closing kicked off at the historic Wembley stadium in faraway London, Adithya Prasad, a younger home surgeon right here, downloaded a cellular app.

Anticipating an English victory in opposition to the Italians, he had deliberate a video with the English supervisor Gareth Southgate holding aloft the trophy. But that video proved stillborn as the Three Lions have been kicked out by the Azzurri in a contest that went proper down the wire. “Just a waste of mobile data,” stated Adithya, sardonically.

For English fans, the variety of whom retains on hovering in the State, thanks in giant measure to the reputation of the English Premier League, there was no greater heartbreak in current occasions.

“For years we were mocked as the perennial losers who turn up with high hopes only to return home defeated. This was the first final featuring England for my generation and we truly believed that it was coming home this time,” rued a diehard English fan Sandeep K.V., who tuned into the match from Bahrain the place he’s working.

No earlier than the closing whistle was blown in Wembley in the early morning hours of Monday than a heated debate kicked off on social media amongst English fans about what went unsuitable.

As passions boiled over, some turned acerbic and attributed the defeat to “clownish” administration by Southgate. “He wasted brilliant attacking talents on the bench and then assigned youngsters with little experience for taking the penalty kicks in a pressure cauldron,” stated Firaz Muhammed Zakariya, a mechanical engineer from Kozhikode.

Abhish Puthussery, one other fan, nevertheless, referred to as for reasoning. “We need to respect a manager who led us to a World Cup semi in 2018 and then did one step better in the Euro,” he argued.

Then as information emerged of English fans going berserk at the stadium and interesting in racial abuse on social media in opposition to the younger gamers who missed the penalty kicks, the debate turned in the direction of the hooliganism of fans.

“I wanted England to win the final, but having seen the havoc wreaked by their fans on visiting fans at Leicester Square and outside Wembley, I no longer rue that they lost,” stated Alan Bince, a scholar of Model Engineering College, Kochi.

Naveen James, a younger legislation skilled and a fanatic English fan, nevertheless, felt that each fanbase has its share of hoodlums. “Just ask Sharapova (tennis ace Maria Sharapova),” he stated. (Sharapova’s social media account was in the previous bombarded by Malayali cricket fans after she stated she didn’t know Sachin Tendulkar.)

As this back-and-forth was happening between English fans, the neutrals and Italian fans, have been busy churning out memes, with “It’s coming home”, from the track ‘Three Lions’ launched forward of the 1996 Euro Cup and has since then turn out to be the de facto anthem of English fans, their goal.