Three Lion's will be following England's 2018/2022 World Cup bid every step of the way with our very own blog. So if you want to keep up to date with the bid that could see football's biggest competition grace the shores of England for the first time in over 50 years, visit this page for regular updates.
May 2009
With many of England's 1966 World Cup winning squad present, the official bid to host the 2018/2022 World Cup kicked off at Wembley Stadium. It was a carnival affair, with David Beckham and Gary Linekar - amongst many other current and Ex England players, joined together with the local community to get things under way.
It seems some dangerous lessons from the past have been learnt. The new campaign slogan "England United, the world invited" graced the stage. The old 'football's coming home' approach dropped - It is felt that the age old argument that England gave football to the world and therefore deserves the right to hold the World Cup simply won't wash any more.
The face of the bid will be David Beckham, and in a rare display of unity Sir David Richards (Chairman of the Premier League), Lord Brian Mawhinney (chairman of the Football League) and Manchester United Chief Executive David Gill, all appeared on stage together. Even British Prime Minister Gordon Brown made an on stage appearance - he was also incidentally the only person to mention the now taboo 'football's coming home'.
There is an air of optimism that England stands a good chance - more so as the world seems agreed that after tournaments in Brazil and South Africa the 2018 World Cup should return to Europe. But England face strong competition from Russia and a joint Spain-Portugal bid.
Would be great to get it as would brind alot of money into the country and from a footballing point of view we have the stadiums and facilities up and down the country including wembley which would be a great host for the final.
We would make a great host Country, Like you say Wembley, Man U are adding to Stadium are they not ?, Depends on how much say Plattini and Blatter have i reckon.
St George And me personally - I don't really see how this is arrogant. Don't think much of the new slogan either.
What club do you support? Was just wondering where you normally post.
Do you like what we've done with the site?
I am a lincoln and leeds fan (not had the best of seasons again) I post on Lincoln city forum. I klike the site and if you can get people from all the team forums together on this it could be packed which has got to be your aim. So far you seem to be getting quite alot of views and replies so good luck with that.
Cheers Dave - that certainly is the aim, we figured we wouldn't be treading on the feet of any other forums, given we're an England board. Hopefully we will get lots of visitors, especially now the domestic season has finished and the U21 Euros are approaching.
The moderation team on here are all from the Midlands, we're two Wolves, one West Brom and one Birmingham - so quite a mix!
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Goldenballs Yes you do wonder if others would really want it in England.
Agreed - we still have that 'thing' hanging over our heads don't we.
Yeh we do. Me (Jemma) and Tony (The Albion Tony!) are partners, and we run the Baggies site on here. Tony (Wolves Tony!) and Carly (Blues) are married, and we know them from posting on our board! We've met up lots of times socially too.
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