FOOTBALL - it's a myth in the grass, thanks to the astonishing conquest of Europe by an unfancied Greece team.

Puns flew thicker than the arrows unleashed from Trojan battlements in the wake of the Greeks bearing all before them. One of my favourites has to have been in honour of Nikos Dabizas, the Greek squad member formerly of Newcastle United, when the triumph was lauded as 'Howay the Iliads.' Classic.

All joking apart, the heavenly Hellenic national triumph should act as a loud, trumpeted warning to the Premiership's pampered platoon.

Back home we pride ourselves in the elite division being the best in the world. We're certainly the fastest, boldest, and arguably the most passionate when you consider the amount of clubs that garner such interest.

But that assertion that we are the best has only got claims to veracity in that many of Europe's other nations have flooded our league with such high-calibre talent.

Home-grown skill is not as dominant as we would have ourselves believe. If evidence was needed then you would only have to point to England's Euro 2004 performance which at best lifted itself out of the ordinary in too few spasmodic spells.

Before the tournament opened the number of pundits who would have taken Greek players ahead of any of England's squad would have been as many as the number of toes on a horse, whether wooden or otherwise.

Yet just look at the successive performances of the Greek team in the knockout stages of the tournament. One goal scored in each of the three matches and not one conceded as the holders France, the new favourites the Czech Republic and ultimately the hosts Portugal were made to pay. No-one can say the Greeks' progress was easy.

So what if Greece looked the old pre-Wenger Arsenal - 1-0, 1-0, 1-0? Anyone in England would have taken such a hat-trick of narrows wins if they could still be now celebrating a Euro summit success.

To their credit and to our embarrassment, yes embarrassment, Greece applied old-fashioned ethics of team-work, sheer industry and no little skill to boot to ensure they shocked the football world and hoisted to blue Agean skies the Henri Delauney Trophy. No superstars, trilled one of their squad players. All superstars now, though, while England's rest their weary frames in exotic climes ahead of the next Premiership merry-go-round of money, money and yet more money.

But it's not just us. Other so-called superpowers bit the dust of despair - France, Italy, Spain to name but three.

Some have suggested a seismic shift in the balance of power. But I'd venture that any of those early exit trio, plus England, could have been standing in happy-clappy-tappy Greek shoes today had they harnessed the same degree of hard graft and team togetherness allied to an eye for prising open the opposition.

To label the Greeks as defensive is an insult. After all, they were the only team to play in all six Euro matches and score in every one. Time for England's perennial stalking horse to break free of its wooden withers.

Most depressing sports news item of the week. Sky's increased coverage of the Premiership - that behemoth of excess - will feature four live top-flight matches over the first weekend of the 2004-05 season. Aarrgh.

Updated: 09:51 Tuesday, July 06, 2004