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On the evening of the 26th of June, 1996, the perennially loathed, obstinately supported England national football team played against the Germans in the semi-finals of the UEFA European Football Championship, and lost the match in penalties (6-5) — an historic defeat decided by a single, unlucky miss.

As it happened, England supporters already had an anthem prepared for this downfall: “Three Lions,” a rousing barn-burner by brit-pop band The Lightning Seeds, with lyrics by comedians David Baddiel and Frank Skinner. “Everyone seems to know the score / they’ve seen it all before,” the song begins. “That England’s gonna throw it away / gonna blow it away.” The chorus is a familiar burden of hope despite constant failure: “Thirty years of hurt / Never stopped me dreaming.”

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It has of course been50years of hurt now, for English football fans: it was all the way back in 1966 that the country won the World Cup for the first and, so far, only time, prevailing over West Germany 4-2 in a victory that’s been savoured to its last enduring ounce through a half-century of demoralized frustration.