Thankfully, the Football Association refused to award caps for this game against a team that would struggle to survive in the English Third Division. It would have been quickly kicked into the dustbin of history but for the after-match antics of a group of the England players, who were pictured getting legless while playing drinking games in a Hong Kong club. This included players having drinks poured down their throats while lying in a pseudo dentist's chair. They then caused a disturbance on the flight home, and the tabloids really went to town on them. It was alleged that Paul Gascoigne was at the centre of the drinking spree, underlining what Graham Taylor had claimed during his England management - that Gazza too often needed to be fuelled by alcohol. The drinking culture was - and remains - a huge problem with too many English footballers.  So the Terry Venables team went into the European championships under a cloud of controversy.

Source Notes

England's Far East trip is one Hong Kong pong. That's the verdict of the man who comes up against Tel's England tomorrow.  Carlton Fairweather was an original member of Wimbledon's Crazy Gang, a leggy striker whose league career was cut short by injury.  Now he's up against England's finest and is shocked Tel has put his European Championship dream at risk against a bunch of has-beens.

Fairweather said: "What the hell is Terry Venables going to learn from us?  Our football is like the bottom of your Third Division. We've got three has-beens, me, Mick Duxbury and Iain Hesford and we'll probably have to drag in an Aussie off the beach and a few Chinese from locals restaurants.  I understand they are also trying to rope in a Slav and a Dutch fellow. It's not for me to say, but the FA should ask what the hell England are doing here?"

Fairweather plays for Golden FC in the second game of the tour and said: "I don't think they realise they are up against a club side.  England's players will learn nothing other that to ask: 'What are we doing here?' If they beat us eight or nine-nil then so what.   But if they lose England and Terry will be the laughing stock of football, another Belo Horizonte, when mighty England, then the giants of world soccer, lost 1-0 to America in 1950. The best thing England should do is use it as a holiday and visit the local island that boasts the biggest Buddha in Asia, and take a ferry and see the skyline. It really is something special.  Why England have flown so far to play matches at this stage of the season baffles me. I keep well up on British soccer and I couldn't believe it when the tour was announced.  Why travel so far to play meaningless matches with the championship so close? Only the powers-that-be can answer that one.  I've noticed Gary Lineker this week asked similar questions.  Like me, he thinks England should have stayed at home, patched up their wounded and played matches behind closed doors.  Even my old mate Vinnie Jones in his Mirror column believed the players should have trained together all week in England and allowed home at weekends to see their families.  England's answer is that Scotland have flown 8,000 to play in America, so what's the difference of us playing in the Far East. I say a lot of difference because I'm here and have done it. America isn't such a cultural shock at China.  It literally is a world of difference.   Playing at this time of the year is a an energy-sapping exercise and the last thing, I believe, an English player would want after such a heavy season. The humidity wets your shirt from dawn and the temperature will be high. I can't see many of the English players wanting to run around for 90 minutes.  We know England will come at us but we've worked on a simple plan. We'll give them the ball, wear out Alan Shearer, wear out his replacement Les Ferdinand and then all we'll have to worry about Robbie Fowler!  In our defence we hope to have Dave Watson, an Evertonian who would love nothing more than to get his legs wrapped around a Red again.   Dave's been on holiday over here and didn't have time to lay down his towel before he was roped in. If England really wanted top opposition they should have flown a bit further to Japan. The Japanese did very well at Wembley last season and would have least offered stiffer opposition.  We've even got a J-League side visiting Hong Kong with a few Brazilians in the team and they would have offered a better test.  Lineker also mentioned if money was the goal then The Football Association must be hard up to accept a deal like this. As an exercise I believe the whole affair is pointless.  The only thing we can offer is a good pitch. Ours is Wembley class, not like those in China. I've played there and they are pretty rank.  Surprised? Yes. Shocked? Yes. I don't know whether money has a big say in things.  We really are Mix and Match United. Mick has seen and done it all and Iain also played to a good standard.  I had a long and super run at Wimbledon, but league football was some time ago for us. Even our manager Simon Wan, the man who organised the trip, isn't a very good coach.  He is a superb organiser, but tactics? Well . . . "

Golden FC are third in the league of nine teams. "We made two cup finals, but overall it's Third Division football.  When I was told they were coming in I thought it was a joke. I'm still laughing.  "There's no problems of worrying about match-fixing here. England should win at a canter.  Personally, I can't complain because it's a given me a nice finish to my career playing against my country. It's a long way from my first club Tooting and Mitcham.  I desperately want England to win the European Championship but this does strike me as an odd way of preparing for it. Still, it's a good place to pick up a cheap watch."

Interview: TONY STENSON (COPYRIGHT 1996 MGN LTD)

TheFA.com
Original newspaper reports
Official teamsheet
Rothman's Yearbooks
F.A. Yearbook
Norman Giller, Football Author
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CG