What do you predict? Just read the El Nino weather event could scupper England's chance:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-27343057

What others do you think we will hear?

Top of the list this year I'd imagine would be "we never expected anything anyway".

The wind will surely help as it'll counter the it's too damn hot excuse?

If we play the younger brigade, it'll be the "we've done better than expected and the newer players have had some invaluable tournament experience". And I'd be happy with that frankly.

If we dare to go out on penalties AGAIN, we have NO excuses surely!

Its rooneys fault.

Thats normally a popular one.

True.

He's already got his customary pre-tournament injury, which is always the first step to things going wrong.

It's those overpaid primadonnas again! Especially Rooney, even if he's injured.

If England fail to make it out of the group stages, I'll blame Suárez.

Ah yes, if Suarez is involved in an incident that results in us exiting the group stage, it'll make the reaction to Ronaldo's "wink" in 2006 look calm and rational

If we get that far, I wonder who will beat us on penalties and who will miss the deciding one?

The heat and humidity of Manaus.

'Rooney clearly wasn't match fit.'

Why do we need excuses? We are pretty awful at International level and getting worse. The weather won't help depending on who we are playing though.

- "The climate worked against us"
- "(X) wasn't fit"
- "(X) and (Y) and (Z) are still young and they'll learn from the experience"
- "It's been a long season. Our players are tired"
- "It wasn't the right time. We are focusing on EURO 2016"
- "The hotel wasn't right"
- "The WAGS were a distraction"
- "Our players were bored"
- "It was the referee's fault"
- "Someone tampered with goal-line technology"
- "Andy Carroll missed a sitter"
- "We need to practice penalties"
- "All of Brazil's goals were offside"
- "We got our tactics wrong"
- "It's Greg Dyke's fault"
- "We need Danny Mills as manager"
- "Gary Neville misses Jamie Carragher"
- "We need B-internationals"

I predict the amount of actual excuses will be a lot smaller than those made up by people who love to whinge about England.

The players were tired after a long season domesticity
We were just happy to get out of the group

The trip wasn't enjoyable and the players weren't having fun...

OTOH

The trip was enjoyable and the players were having fun...

Boll*cks.

England aren't actually anywhere near as bad as people on here and elsewhere try to make out. The football might not always be brilliant but it's something like 27-28 losses out of about 150 games since the start of 2000. Hardly awful is it?

There won't be many excuses on here, just the usual people on here sh*tting on England.

I don't think many people expect us to get out of the group. It will be a really tough ask, but to be honest it could help England having to perform from the off. Let's throw Lallana, Shaw and Barkley on and go for it. What is there to lose?

It's ITV's fault.

Expectations are lower this time around than at other tournaments so I'll predict that everyone will remain level-headed and pragmatic. If England get through the group then this will likely change. On the whole though, I think England fancy themselves less than they do normally going into World Cups.

To be honest I think every country will have their fans who are a bit overbearing and unrealistic. England's just get more stick because we live in a country comprised of four nations and only England tend to qualify for these events so the fans of the other 3 nations are subjected to the pro-England hysteria through the shared television channels and media.

The last time Austria won the Eurovision song contest in 1966 England won the World Cup.

Over to you England.

"We got the guts ache"

That's mostly in qualifying, at tournament level we are spectacularly average in every way.

Since 2000, England's record in major tournaments has been:

2002 - Quarter finals
2004 - Quarter finals
2006 - Quarter finals
2008 - Did not qualify
2010- Round of 16
2012 - Quarter finals

So, apart from the Euros in 08, England have got to the quarters in most other tournaments. Not many other sides have managed to do that on a consistent basis, so I would say England are above average in tournaments.

Just waiting for the usual comments that "they are over-paid yobs who only care about money and not the game"

Actually from what I read in the Sun (at work) its already started!

Rooney was getting a hard deal from somebody in the letters section over the fact he gets paid 300k a week for "doing nothing" whilst Mark Selby "only" got 300k for spending hours playing and winning the snooker.