Football is rife with untruths (shock horror): the kiss of a badge, the denial of an imminent transfer or the backing of a manager already half way out the exit door. However, some untruths have come from misguidance and no matter how absurd the myth, us football fans have stuck by them religiously; here they are, the myths that just don’t add up.

“A team are at their most vulnerable after they’ve scored”

Andy Gray on Fifa 2010 used this line more than Ronaldo ends up on the floor; admittedly it does happen, and did regularly to me on Fifa 10 (especially from my friend Tim, who had an uncanny knack of pegging me back straight away), but there are ample amounts of occasions where this hasn’t been the case.

“It only takes a second to score a goal”

Has anyone actually scored when the clock reads “00:01”? I know I’m just being pernickety, but still. Usually it is a second that the ball leaves the players boot to hitting the net but surely you have to consider the build up play beforehand?

“There are no easy games in international football”

I’m sure striker Archie Thompson would have begged to differ, after bagging thirteen goals when Australia beat Samoa 32-0.

“These things even themselves out over the course of the season”

They quite clearly don’t, furthermore it contradicts the other old age myth that ‘luck goes against you when you are at the bottom’.

Germans are very ordered and rigid

The way the likes of Mesut Ozil and Thomas Muller danced around opposition players in South Africa well and truly destroyed the myth that Germany can’t produce skillful, but rather functional players (Dietmar Hamann and Michael Ballack come to mind).

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