"The coverage has been fantastic" squealed an over-excited guest on BBC Radio 5 live. Of course, she wasn't talking about the latest "Mission: Impossible" outing of England's soccer team in the Euro 2012 qualifiers. The ongoing rescue of 33 Chilean miners, trapped underground since 5 August, tends to dwarf the efforts of 22 footballers playing out a sterile draw at Wembley Stadium. It boils down to human interest vs. the not remotely interesting.
As they emerge into the sunlight, the doughty Chileans will find that much has changed since their incarceration began—anonymity is certainly a thing of the past. But, in a changing world, it's comforting to know that Fabio "the Communicator" Capello and his not-so-merry men can be relied upon to fall into yet another pit of their own making. As they left the field after a goalless draw with Montenegro, the reception was in marked contrast to the enthusiasm which has greeted the heroes of the San Jose mine.
If Capello thought that the vexed issue of the England captaincy had gone away, he was sadly mistaken. Once it became clear that central defender Rio Ferdinand would be in the starting line-up for the first time since May, media speculation about the armband went into overdrive. Steven Gerrard was acknowledged to have done a good job in Rio's absence—except for the trifling matter of England's tame exit from the World Cup. Would the tough-talking Italian's diplomatic skills be up to resolving an issue of such earth-shattering importance? In the end, the man whose mantra is “I never change my rules’’, reinstated Ferdinand as skipper and was roundly criticised by those who felt he'd been stringing Gerrard along for the past month.
So what of England's latest opponents in Group G? Back in the '80s, Montenegro was the title of a daring erotic comedy drama in which a bored American expat in Sweden (played by Susan Anspach) hooks up with some free-living Yugoslavians for two nights of debauchery. As film critic Roger Ebert says, "There can be something absolutely liberating about a movie that makes up its rules as it goes along."
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