EUROTASTICS 2! England v Sweden

Yeah, it was never in doubt! Easy! Well, apart from the fairly turgid first half and hapless defending of much of the second, obviously... I watched this one with another high-rise view, this time from the east of the city in Mile End, surrounded by shouty boys, beer and pizza, taking advantage of James and Steve's ginormo telly turned up to, as Steve put it, 'pub volume', for extra atmosphere, y'know. It was fun to hear the argy-bargy of the chaps, and their takes on various players (Andy Carroll: 'Rollie-Smoking Binman'; Oxlade-Chamberlain: 'sounds like a posh sausage'; John Terry: hhm, probably not for Fever Bitch readers' delicate eyes...), and the wild lurching from gallows humour to delirious optimism.  The England boys seemed to revert mostly back to their lumpen selves for much of the game, apart from Carroll's big moment, tearing apart his shirt to reveal some sort of superhero logo as he leapt 50 metres into the air to head the ball in off his oily mane. Elsewhere, there was some rocky stuff from Cole and Gerrard, and some flashes of nonsense from John Terry, who also ran like, well, ME (NB this is not a compliment. I run like a GIRL). Out with the old, in with the new, I say: let's slough off all that dead meat! It was all about our young whippersnappers, with Walcott's wonder-goal and fizzing runs, and early '90s House Party-era throwback Danny Welbeck with his bonkers blind-twist-backheel number, like some brilliant renegade move from Strictly Come Dancing. TATTOO OF THE MATCH: Andy Carroll's back. And not in a good way. Like he accidentally wandered into the hut of a fairground cod-mystic fortune-teller who got happy with the felt-tips. Just horrific. ADVICE OF THE DAY: 'Put Ashley Young in the wall, doing nothing; just being a wall!' Lee Dixon, exasperated SHIRT-WATCH: the two most articulate pundits at the Beeb this evening were the ones shouting to make themselves heard on the touchline with Gabby. David James looked like a systems analyst from Caterham on night out uptown, with a noisy striped number; Martin Keown, astonishingly, is ageing well, especially with those tight trousers, decent haircut and jaunty hand on hip. Perky! CRAP ARTY JOKE OF THE DAY: (a riff on an excellent Twitter joke from this evening) That Roy Hodgson's a marvel. Not only does he read books but he employs authors as well. Who'd have thought a controversialist author, post-colonialist poet and magic realist avant la lettre would all score! God bless Houellebecq, Walcott and  Carroll! ADORABLES: Quite liked Mellberg's beard. Hearty and Swedish, like a herring fisherman from Smaland. ROY HODGSON EXPRESSION-WATCH: Much nail-biting and wishing he could hide his face in a copy of Beware of Pity. But also clapping!