I'm Scottish, but I want England to win the World Cup

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jun/07/im-scottish-but-i-want-england-to-win-world-cup

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Four World Cups will soon have elapsed since Scotland last participated in the greatest show on Earth. Despite a pleasing recent sequence of results under Gordon Strachan, it's difficult to see that run ending soon. Perhaps it is time to send a hand-picked team of handsome Scottish women to Rio to seek concupiscence on the Copacabana with some promising young locals. At least that might just give us half a chance for Greenland 2034.

Decades of allowing an assortment of dreadful incompetents such as Ernie Walker and Jim Farry to run our game have taken a heavy toll on our national team. As every other nation on Earth, it seemed, was leapfrogging us on the Fifa rankings list, no coherent plan or strategy was forthcoming to arrest the demise. There was no inquiry into the way the national game had been ruined by committees full of rank and florid wee men with moustaches who ought never have been allowed to do anything other than arrange fixtures for their bowling clubs and golf clubs.

Then we sat and watched as they destroyed the greatest football stadium in the world and replaced it with a depressing, custom-built effort that looks like it was purchased bit by bit from Ikea.

Meanwhile we permitted too many unsuitable adults to gain coaching badges and left them free to indulge their obsession with terrorising young boys every Saturday on the nation's playing fields. Not that we have many of those left under local government scorched-earth policy of selling our open spaces.

The neglect of the national game has been deep and persistent and the winnowing of our skills base complete and utter. It will take many more years before we arrive at a time when enough very good young players emerge together to give us a chance of qualifying for a World Cup. That's assuming that they manage to make it past the clumsy interventions of the tracksuited Boabys, Rabs and Tams who have damaged the prospects of so many other gifted young Scots.

Even the pleasure that is to be derived from knowing that at least those indolent clowns in the Tartan Army won't be around to shame the nation doesn't fill the void of Scotland failing to qualify. I know it can be a rewarding experience watching the world's finest players display their skills, but knowing that none of them is a Scot and that we don't have a dog at this fight can be depressing.

We then have to work hard to ensure that each game has some sort of meaning. How can anyone watch a football match and not care who wins?

On those occasions where you hate or admire each of the contestants equally, then you must look hard for something else to determine who carries your favour. And so I have ranked all the best countries according to my own political correctness guide so that all good liberal lefties everywhere can imbue each big game with meaning and back the right team with a clear conscience. So here are my ethical top five, followed by my unethical five.

England

I always support England anyway but would commend them to all my comrades. This is also to shame Scotland's tiresome anti-England brigade and show that, even if we do decide to become independent on 18 September, we can still be mature enough to wish our gallant neighbours all the very best. And so I'll be rooting for the three lions.

Brazil

My fondness for Braziliant Brazil has diminished in recent tournaments. The bald facts are that several of their stars such as Neymar and Luiz are cheating bandits and I've never really got over the Ronaldo incident at the 1998 World Cup final that allowed the bastard French to triumph. However, just the knowledge that a home triumph would make millions of poor in the favelas happy would make me happy too.

Italy

How can you not love the Italians? Their passion for the game is so great that they are what Scotland could be if we had proper coaches. They also make cynicism an artform and Britain's immigrant Italian communities are an eternal rebuke to Ukip and their racist supporters.

Argentina

I've always liked them since they fought Thatcher for the Malvinas, which are, of course, rightfully theirs.

Iran

They've had my vote since they kicked the corrupt old shah out and then kidnapped all those American spies who had helped him rob his nation of millions. Was I the only one who watched Argo and hoped that the ayatollah's secret police would catch that plane?

US

Perhaps they can meet Iran at some point and get their sorry Yankee arses well and truly whupped again. Its judiciary spends its time executing black men, and they allow their schoolchildren to be shot to death by permitting the gun lobby to run the country.

Russia and Croatia

The presence of this pair in civilised sporting arenas is an affront to common decency. For decades, their fans have been racially abusing black footballers from all over the world. Russia are a disgrace to the old Soviet Union and those splendid red shirts with CCCP stitched on to them.

Nigeria

What I would dearly love most is for a rainbow team of homosexual professional footballers to play Nigeria, and roundly beat them.

Switzerland

This is probably the most pointless nation on Earth. Choosing to remain neutral in the face of the Third Reich's bid for world domination was as obscene as Nazism itself. Since then, it has become a haven for looted Nazi art and international money-laundering. Always delighted to see the Swiss getting gubbed.

Other than this, I sincerely hope that the 20th World Cup is an occasion for nations to eschew bitterness and hatred and come together in an atmosphere of fraternal goodwill.