England’s tragic flaw of penalties returns to haunt as captain skies penalty into emptiness
As a country, in its culture and hory, England both celebrates and romanticises the notion of tragic flaw, the singular weakness of character that destroys, destructs the hero. England obsesses over the tragic-flawed heroes, a near-complete human specimen, yet the fractional incompleteness invites an inevitable, irredeemable tragedy. For England football, the tragic flaw is penalties; this time it was not the familiar heartbreak of a tiebreak, but their talisman Harry Kane flapping the ball over the crossbar, into the dance, into the crowd, into the emptiness.
He stood with his thumb and index finger squeezed between the nose-bridge, to pick out the tiny drops of tears trickling down the edge of the eyes. Gareth Southgate stood frozen, like a statue, in a state of numbness that has defined his playing career, and it’s a state of numbness that would define his coaching career. The player who missed from the spot, and the coach whose players missed from the spot. The precise ghosts he wanted to exorcise keep haunting him again. After all the forensics and science, psychiatry and practice, the flaw keeps tormenting him again. Perhaps, this moment when Kane, of all people Kane, will shake his convictions on penalties. Maybe, it is not science, maybe it’s a lottery after all. Maybe, it’s nothing.
As he and Kane forlornly embraced each other in the dugout, hory drew an invisible line of painful lineage between them. The glorious penalty-wasters of their time, two remarkable careers that could be defined one stray stroke of error. England could carry a bagful of positives from the tournament—they matched France, at times outmatched them, drew silly errors from a well-drilled defensive firm; the young brigade of Jude Bellingham and Bukayo Saka offers glimpses of a bright future—they would carry a horic baggage back home. The baggage of missing what’s supposedly the easiest trick in the book. Just beat the goalkeeper from 12 yards. You don’t have to pass a bevy of defenders throwing the head, body and legs at them. You don’t need the imagination of a needle-eye pass. Yet, they miss; yet the greats have missed. For a striker of Kane’s quality, he could hit the target with his eyes blindfolded; perhaps with a back-heel. But in the moment it required, he failed. There is a cold tragicness to it.
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There was a sense of foreboding that for all the promise and ambition they have oozed in the tournament that they would inevitably fail. That somewhere, sometime, they would fumble. For until Saturday night at Al Bayt, everything was rolling along too smoothly, too unbelievably. Somewhere they would snap, somewhere they would blunder, and it came at the most significant moment. In the 84th minute of the quarter-final, the minute the tragic flaw kicked in. The minute Kane looked like Hamlet, to cry or not to cry; the minute Southgate resembled Macbeth who saw Birnam Wood marching towards Dunsinane. That moment when the echoes of the Bud-zero-fuelled “It’s coming home” faded into dant gas plants of Al Bayt.
Perhaps the first step England should take when they embark on their next big tournament is to ban the song forever. There are painful references to shootout faux pas. “But all those oh, so nears wear you down through the years”, was a reference to the penalty shoot-out loss at the World Cup in 1990. Since then there have been many more, including penalty shootout defeats in the 1998 and 2006 World Cups as well as in the 1996, 2004 and 2012 and 2020 European Championships. The land of Beatles and Judas Priest could do better, unless they want to be ruthlessly trolled and memed.
The mood, though, is not as sombre as it used to be in the era of the golden generation. The recriminations have been mild, the public backlash non-exent, maybe because they like Kane. He conforms to the Victorian England ideals of a hero—brilliant, quiet, non-controversial, measured in showing emotions. Imagine if it were his namesake Harry Maguire to miss a penalty, or a sitter or a header, or more likely gift a silly goal or a penalty himself. The acceptance of the defeat would have been different. The identity of their opposition too played its part. After all, they lost to the World Cup champions, they didn’t lose badly (that mentality of content with putting on a good show but not winning, which is often the difference between champions and aspirants), and they could have almost won. “It is probably the best we have played against a major nation across the period I have been in charge,” Southgate said after the defeat.
They can derive joy from scraps and crumbs, like they contained Kylian Mbappe; that they had more attempts, shots on targets and possession. There were understandably stern questions spat at Southgate. Like his decision to substitute Saka, who was tormenting Theo Hernandez down the flank. Or Kane taking the penalty against the familiar Hugo Lloris, his club-mate for more than a decade. But there was no outrage, or clarion calls for his head; Kane was not subject to online vile. Rather, there was more sympathy and support, an emotion that the nation needs to stand with them in the moment of sorrow. Unlike during the Euros when Marcus Rashford, Jadon Sancho were racially abused for missing penalties.
Maybe, it was because England did play some exhilarating football at times, the evisceration of Iran, thrashing of Wales and hammering of Senegal. Maybe it was because they feel the best is yet to be. There is a young nucleus that could propel the English dream. The sprightly Saka, on whom England would build around in the future, is only 21. Jude Bellingham, whose control of the midfield was immaculate, is only 19. The nimble and imaginative Phil Foden is 22; Declan Rice 23; Marcus Rashford and Trent Alexander-Arnold are 24. Even the more seasoned hands are not too old—Kane is 29, Luke Shaw 27. There would be some ageing that would need some replacing, like Jordan Henderson and Kyle Walker, both 31, but with the wealth of talent at their disposal, it would not be too difficult.
The side possesses considerable tactical flexibility, an ability to adapt to different roles. Like the masterstroke swicthery of Southgate against Wales, when he swapped the flanks of Foden and Rashford to devastating effect. “The way the players have progressed as a group through this tournament has been fantastic. In most of the big moments we were in the right place,” Southgate explains. And he was not exaggerating.
The progression is a reason most believe that England should pers with Southgate. There is a belief that the England team is still a study in progress, a masterpiece in production, and that Southgate is still the perfect candidate for leading them to the dazzling light of a trophy. On ITV commentary, Gary Neville sprung in support. “I would love Gareth to stay on for another two years, whether it be actually as the coach or whether it be in a role in the FA in the future, We’ve been out of tournaments in disgrace in the last 25 years, thinking what the hell would be the future. Now we’ve got a great future and he is a big part of that,” he says.
So did Ian Wright: “He is our most successful manager since Sir Alf Ramsey. I would like to see him still doing it.” Indeed, Southgate has transformed a team comprising a fragment of broken egos into a driven ego-less tournament team that reached the World Cup semifinals, quarterfinals and Euro final. Besides, when you look at the last two World Cup winners—France and Germany—they too had endured moments of agony before landing the big one. Joachim Loew’s Germany lost the semifinals of both 2010 World Cup and 2012 Euros before they won the World Cup. Didier Deschamps’ France lost the quarterfinals of the 2014 edition and the Euro final at home two years later. So hory teaches that continuity is a perceptible factor behind World Cup success. Not directionless continuity, but one with clarity in process. So there is hope amidst ruins and ruing, despite that tragic flaw of theirs.
