ALL IN THE GAME:A World Cup miscellany

"THANK HEAVEN The Few didn't defend as badly as England's footballers in Bloemfontein, otherwise we'd all be speaking German," wrote Richard "Winston" Littlejohn in the Daily Mail, setting the tone for the post mortem in the English press on the team's World Cup exit.

Littlejohn compared Matthew Upson, somewhat unfavourably, to World War II “fighter ace” Douglas Bader. “It’s unfair to single out Upson, however,” he conceded, “this was a collective surrender, right up there with the fall of France in 1940. Capello’s wingless wonders turned out to be about as much use as a squadron of wingless Spitfires.”

The Sunalso brought up the war, albeit a more contemporary one. "More than 150 of Our Boys crammed into the Naafi at Camp Bastion (in Afghanistan) but began walking out before the final whistle. "Any of us looking for a morale boost didn't get one," said Cpl Dan Davey. The paper's message to the players was, "You Let Your Country Down." "Time to go, Fabio, clear off – and take these losers with you," they said, quoting fans. "I have a large St George flag at home," said Phil from Bournemouth. "I'll now cross out the red bits so I have a white flag – because we surrendered."

The Daily Mirroropted for "Fabigo!", while Oliver Holt wrote: "Fabio the Tyrant, Fabio the Great Dictator, Fabio the Scourge of the Baby Bentley Brigade, Fabio Our Saviour: lost in a fetid pool of disillusion and dismay."

The German press, meanwhile, was full of remorse for the goal-that-wasn't. "That was revenge for Wembley," howled Berliner Kurier, harking back to 1966. Italian sports newspaper La Gazzetta dello Sportwent a bit multilingual:

“Capello Kaputt!”

Italians put back in their boxes by media: Coffin cartoon offends winger Pepe

COLD WELCOME: ENGLAND WEREN'T the only World Cup side to receive a less than warm welcome home, the players of Cameroon, for example, greeted with a banner that read "You do not love Cameroon – Shame on you" on their return.

The Italians, naturally enough, weren't greeted with open arms either, something winger Simone Pepe couldn't complain about – he did, though, object to the cartoon that appeared on the front page of Il Giornale, one that showed the team represented by coffins and the Italian flag at half mast.

"That was going too far," he said, "I accept criticism, but depicting us in coffins is offensive.

"Whoever drew such a thing should be an undertaker. I hope soon they get to build a coffin for him instead – not blue, but brown."

The artist, Giorgio Forattini, thanked Pepe for his death wish and defended his work. "Against Slovakia I saw 11 cadavers out there. It was not my intention to wish death upon the players, obviously. If anything I wanted to describe the sporting death of our Nazionale. That is all.

"Pepe's reaction was far worse, but I take his words with a smile upon my lips."

Forattini's editor, Vittorio Feltri, was a touch more forthright. "A vignette is a vignette," he said of the cartoon. "If Pepe knew how to read, he'd realise the message was not the physical death of the players, but the death of our football. Perhaps the players have not understood just how indignant the Italians are at this elimination.

"They should hide away, instead now they will go to the beach to enjoy all the money that they earn."

Officials are out of line: El Paisshow little sympathy

URUGUAYAN REFEREE Jorge Larrionda and his assistant Mauricio Espinosa got little support from their national press after the Frank Lampard "goal" on Sunday, El Paisdescribing their failure to spot the ball had crossed the line as "a gross error", one that "will forever be part of the black history of the World Cup". But was it an error? The photo above appears to suggest not.

There was a crooked man and he walked a . . .

Bold bid: Tutu offered Fifa man heaven for his support

BRIBE, WHAT BRIBE?WORLD CUP committee chief executive Danny Jordaan has dished the dirt on Archbishop Desmond Tutu, revealing that the Nobel Peace Prize winner – who had insisted he would support only a bribe-free South African bid to host the finals – actually offered Fifa a bribe in return for their support.

"At our first meeting with the Fifa executive he said: 'If you vote for us, I will make sure that you get a first class ticket to heaven'," Jordaan claimed.

"I kept quiet, and when we went out, I said: 'Arch, you said we must not bribe. Isn't that a bribe?'.

"He said: 'No, no, it's not a bribe. A bribe is only when you give things to people who are alive. In order to get their first-class ticket, they must first die. That's not a bribe'.