It would seem suitably British to stoically pass off the failures of England at the World Cup (and the lack of any other qualifying home nations), or the whimper with which Andy Murray failed to defend his Wimbledon title today (and the whimper with which all of the other British entrants went out at the first hurdle). However, when the groans of centre court resound at another unforced error or Steven Gerrard meekly gives the ball away in midfield I can't help but feel gut-wrenchingly guilty on their behalf - as if I had committed the error myself.
It isn't with patriotism that I feel this way, in fact I recoil at our archaic national anthem ('God save the queen': a lyric that completely undermines any pride I had in our country to begin with, implying deference to a fictional deity and an impotent monarch). Instead I empathise with the individuals involved, because they are British and therefore in the grand scheme of things they have had relatively similar upbringings to my own. They haven't grown up in a favela or in the cataclysm of some natural disaster, rather they are the product of a great deal of money, time and effort. We have several affluent systems in place which are tasked with developing our youngsters into professional sportsmen, funded by the Premier League and the National Lottery. So, where are we going wrong?
It would be best to observe, I suppose, that we are a relatively small nation of people - despite our wealth - and that we don't have the pool of people to draw our talent from. This argument works at an Olympic level (where the achievement of countries tends to correlate with such things - and in fact we have done extremely well recently), but we have the most watched football league in the world, with clubs that have some of the richest history in world football, along with the most watched tennis tournament in the world (and tennis clubs and foundations that run alongside it). Our achievements in these sports pale in comparison to countries like Germany, Spain and Italy (and we can't rely on the old 'we have less people than them' argument either).
Greg Dyke is improvising a number of (to his detractors) ill-founded schemes to improve the talent available to the English national team (such as the introduction of premier league U21 teams to the football league), and there are many grassroots efforts to find the next British tennis talent. It seems as though we are trying to reverse the trend in both sports, but will it work? I find it hard to believe that we'll ever see a Brit with the natural flair and ability of a Lionel Messi or Roger Federer. That being said, 18 year old Scottish footballer Ryan Gauld has just signed with Sporting Lisbon - a Portuguese team renowned for their youth system - and has been touted as the 'Scottish Messi' (which seems like an oxymoron to me). Ross Barkley of Everton seems to have a portion of that flair in his game, yet also seems to be afflicted with the accursed modern English temperament (run around trying to do everything and fail to do anything). I say modern, because we did win something once, but unfortunately '1966'has become something of a stick to beat us with - with every world cup that passes we cling onto a victory 4 years further away.
Andy Murray had to leave the country to become the player he is today, spending his late teens in a Spanish tennis academy. Therefore, ironically (or perhaps conveniently) he cannot be considered a product of our many sporting schemes. Therein lies the problem, in my opinion, that the games of tennis and national football require a mental resilience and arrogance that cannot be acquired from a childhood in Britain. Perhaps our lives are too comfortable, or the distractions too abundant, but there does appear to be something in the water - so to speak. I hope I'm wrong, for sport is best enjoyed when there is a side to support; and one hopes that the pain endured will make future victories all the more sweet.
