Only the fans are big in Japan

4. Belgian fans at Japan v Belgium were chanting in English. This included: "We love you Belgium, we do", "Come on you reds", and, after their first goal, "You're not singing any more", which really wasn't going to have much impact on the Japanese fans.

5. Benny Hill was right. It's more of a general point about Japan, I admit, but there simply is no getting away from this: as far as the English voices produced by their bilingual buttons are concerned, they have no ristened.

I spent about half an hour talking to a Japanese person the other day about how parts of Tokyo are meant to be the basis for the look of Blade Runner, to no avail. But I knew she knew the film. I knew what was wrong.

Eventually, may God forgive me, I went for it. I said: "You know: Brade Lunner." And, no word of a lie, her face cleared instantly and she said, "Oh yes! Hallison Ford!" The best example of the continuing power of the l and r mixup is in Shinjuku, the red-light district, where there is a bar called Angel Kiss, underneath which it says, fantastically, "Talent in Pub"; but, even more fantastically, on the other side of the door it actually says "Tarent in Pub". English fans must have been piling in there every night assuming he's hosting a celebrity pub-quiz.

6. There is a major shrine in the centre of Tokyo called "Hi Ginger" which has been attracting a lot of visits from Irish fans and Paul Scholes.

I say all this, of course, mainly to avoid talking about the England game.

I'm sure it's all been said by now: Beckham was playing too wide, Scholes too deep, and the defence too badly. I don't know why Sven has resorted, at this late stage, to playing the long ball game, but if he must, then someone needs to tell his players that they need to knock the ball over the opposing defence so that Owen can run on to them, rather than just onto the heads of the players who tower above him. The mood of the fans at the game was weird, partly because that band who are at every game insisted on playing We're On The Ball too much, rather than Three Lions - a clear error - and partly because, although it seemed as if the crowd was packed with England fans, this was an illusion: about 80 per cent were Japanese fans in England shirts, who only get excited when the ball is about five yards from the goal - at which point they scream.

The hardcore England support was therefore only in pockets around the enormous stadium, which meant chanting and singing never built up a real momentum, except after the goal: and soon after that, of course, the team panicked, because they're all so young - I bumped into David Platt the day after the game, who said, "they need someone like Tony Adams, don't they? Just to calm things down" (and I wanted to promote him from the Under-21s' management immediately, come to think of it, I'd be happy if the team had someone like David Platt) - which meant that the mood of the fans became progressively more edgy and depressed, until Sweden scored, and then it never really recovered. The ones immediately around me were reduced to singing "Have you ever seen Freddie with a bird?" and, would you believe it, the bloody band joined in.

Still, England fans I've spoken to have cheered up a bit since - mainly because they've drunk so much - and the feeling is that if we get it together, we needn't lie down and lose to Argentina. The worry is that if we do lose and Sweden beat Nigeria, then of course Argentina and Sweden may just play out a draw in the last game, but let's not think of that: onwards and upwards to Sapporo, where at least the fans should be okay for beer.

One final note: the mood of the fans was not helped post-match by the alarmingly large Japanese police presence, both outside the ground and in all major nightspots in Tokyo. Someone has told the person in charge of security at this World Cup that ownership of an England shirt is basically tantamount to saying "I'm going to smash this bar up" which they should know is wrong as it may be the only one showing all the games. The police around the stadium were actually carrying light sabres - completely true - red flashing ones, which they were using to point the unwashed hordes of Boss Whitey in various directions. Any second I was expecting Hallison Ford to turn up.