Harry Kane’s penalty was 2022 in a nutshell

Merry Christmas and England are out of the World Cup: two statements that make complete sense on their own but together are as incongruous as Donald Trump dancing a Billericay hoedown.

We can, at least, now stop arguing about whether it was right to hold the World Cup in a country with such an abominable human rights record that even Suella Braverman would refuse to fly refugees there. But England has also given us a way to ground ourselves back in reality. It’s Christmas, after all, and in the words of Andy Williams, “it’s a most wonderful time of the year”, by which he obviously meant “depressing”, “challenging”, if not “downright sinister”.

We all have far bigger things to feel miserable about than a defender who can’t regularly make it into Man United’s back four. We have heating prices, war, and the inevitable victory of some sausage roll-based tune to make it to number one in the charts. It’s also panto season, about which one former jungle resident famously told Ant & Dec, “the horror, the horror”. I think we all have enough on our plates… unless by that we’re talking about food.

There is, however, one good thing to come out of the World Cup loss and that gift was in the possession of Harry “Lionheart” Kane. It was in the 84th minute when “Captain Fantastic” had a chance to prolong our misery into extra time so we could depressingly lose a penalty shootout. Captain Harry could have levelled the score after Mason “Spitfire” Mount was brought down in the box. Kane then proceeded to launch the subsequent penalty so high above the goal that he shall henceforth be known as “Harry Crane”.

In his apology to England fans, Kane described the miss as “a small detail” which is a gift we can be sure will keep on giving. After all, hasn’t 2022 been the year of “small details”?

A budget that cratered the economy: a small detail.

Waging war with a neighbour in a way that exposed the systemic weakness of your armed forces, destroyed your political legacy, and gives plotters good reason to test the tensile strength of a Russian noose: a small detail.

Spend billions on a social media company which you then manage to destroy because of your toxic presence: a small detail.

Yet each of those catastrophic mistakes can still be said to be smaller than Kane skying the ball over the Persian Gulf. He wasn’t even close to hitting something French. It was lucky the ball wasn’t considered a threat by Israel’s Iron Dome system. SpaceX launches rockets that take longer to get into orbit. Hard to believe but even Russia has missiles that are more accurate.

Okay, enough jokes.

Well, maybe one more: Iran issued a statement saying they considered the shot to be a provocative act and responded by putting three men in a rowboat to wag their fingers at the US Fifth Fleet.

Such was the epic scale of Kane’s miss that one wonders if it’s not the biggest of the previously mentioned “small details”. To match Crane’s epic fail: Musk would need to put in a bid for Facebook, Liz Truss announce her bid to become Governor of the Bank of England, and, Putin open up a second front against the Chinese.

It all bodes well for 2023.

We’ve now enjoyed a succession of years when we didn’t believe that things could get worse, only for fate to drop a shoulder, slip the ball between our legs, and then knock it into the far corner. One year we’re all ruing the depressing news that the Queen can’t attend COP26 in person, the next that the King can’t attend COP27 in person. Only now, thanks to Captain Skyhook, we are prepared for whatever comes next. We can learn from his mistake and dismiss our future failures as “a small detail”.

So, when the government announces in February that a bookkeeping error means that Kent is now owned by Michelle Mone: a small detail.

When Liz Truss’ resignation honours see President Xi elevated to the Lords: a small detail.

When Rishi Sunak is caught skinny-dipping in his Olympic-sized hot tub whilst the rest of the country is chipping icicles from our nostrils: a small detail.

A “small detail” really does cover up a multitude of crimes, which is fortunate since “a multitude of crimes” also happens to be my prediction for 2023.

Happy Christmas!