2010 was definitely the moment where the narrative of 'England can do well this time, honest!' seemed to crumble. They had breezed qualifying, everyone saw Capello as a great antidote to McLaren's dismal reign, they had a relatively soft World Cup group, and then they were just so bad in the tournament (to the extent that nobody even complained that much about Lampard's over the line not given goal) it seemed to be the final straw. That sense of entitlement hasn't been there in 2012 and 2014, everyone's been too gloomy.

England tend to do well in qualifying anyway, the qualifying campaigns for the 1994 World Cup and Euro 2008 (where England failed) and Euro 2000 (England won three games, two of which were against Luxembourg and scraped through a playoff) tend to be the exceptions.