I saw a great tweet from Tony Evans yesterday, talking about about a hypothetical injury to Harry Kane:
Back to football for a moment. Given Southgate did not offer any playing time to Toney and Abraham, when do we reckon Kane picks up THAT injury? In the north London derby (allowing him to go to Qatar at about 40%) or in early November?
— Tony Evans (@TonyEvans92a) September 27, 2022
I feel like it’s been a while since we had the “injury to a key player in the build up to a major tournament” narrative to contend with. In 2002, it was David Beckham. Ever the trend setter, it felt like he was the player to really bring the broken metatarsal into the mainstream, suffering the injury in April 2002 ahead of the World Cup in Japan & South Korea. Installed as captain by Peter Taylor after the resignation of Kevin Keegan, Beckham hadn’t played any club football at all following the injury, and if I remember rightly, there was a great deal of media discussion surrounding his inclusion in the squad. It kind of worked out for him; he completed his ’98-’02 redemption arc with the winning penalty against Argentina in the groups, though he was nowhere near his best and England succumbed to 10-man Brazil in the quarters.
Wayne Rooney followed suit 4 years later, also breaking his metatarsal in April 2006. Still only 20 at the time and coming off an amazing debut tournament at the Euros in 2004, he had become the beacon of hope for a nation starting to wonder if the “golden generation” was really capable of achieving anything. Like Beckham, he was clearly unfit, and the frustration of the whole situation was probably a huge factor in his red card in the quarter final. If only Sven had had the guts to play Walcott; an unknown and fearless Theo just might have been the key. Instead, Michael Owen’s knee exploded, Rooney huffed and puffed and we ended up just lumping it up to Peter Crouch. Golden Generation. Jesus Christ.
So, cometh the hour, cometh the man. A North London Derby, Granit Xhaka on the other side long overdue a red card. Less than two months to go until the start of the tournament. What was once football’s must-have injury has been waiting in the wings too long. My only hope is that by talking about it with such certainty, I can jinx it in to not happening…
Todays feeling: An unfit Harry Kane lumbers around while Tammy Abraham sits bored on the sidelines as we go out in the group.