The obvious comparisons have already been made between Brexit and Hapless Hodgson’s footballers.

As I watched England turn cluelessness into a high art form on Monday night, Harry Kane’s 40 metre free kick that almost hit the corner flag the magnum opus, I couldn’t help adding my own thoughts.

As poor old Roy sat in the dugout looking like a confused traveller waiting at the wrong bus stop for the Number 19 I began to see things from a European perspective.

For no-one on the continent will miss the Three Lions version of the Keystone Cops and our, for the most part, horrible army of boozing, fighting fans. A sigh of relief could almost be heard among the titters across the Channel.

The tournament can now get on with rescuing the beautiful game watched over by largely good-natured supporters who seem able to mingle without recourse to songs about the Second World War.

And in time I believe Europe will also turn disbelief that we voted to leave the union into a collective shrug of the shoulders.

For at the moment England is full of too much toxicity to have meaningful relations with anyone. We need time to settle down, to begin to heal our own huge divisions before we can look outward again. The face we currently show to a baffled world is unlikely to win a beauty contest any time soon.

I wrote last week before the vote that this referendum has stirred up an ugliness in the country. In many ways the EU debate became a lightning rod for protest not its primary cause and the whipped up false statements and promises from politicians fanned the flames.

But of course protests are genuine forms of expression. Huge swathes of forgotten England were given the chance to bloody the nose of what we now call the “establishment”.

That is not the problem except to say that a simple Yes/No vote on a massive range of issues was far too simplistic a method to decide all of our futures.

No the real issue is in the tone of our language and the sudden surge of our intolerance levels.

Not surprisingly much of this bacteria resides in the u-bends in the pipe work of easy access, rush-to-judgement social media.

To visit Facebook pages where people are discussing Brexit is to hurry quickly down a dank, foreboding, down town alleyway after midnight.

Some of the language used by those who voted Leave is desperate. God knows what it would have been like had they lost.

This newspaper has often criticised the Green Party in Brighton as part of its remit to shine a light of the activities of our communities. But the abuse handed out to Caroline Lucas for example is way beyond the pale.

Elsewhere those who would criticise and call for Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn to step down have been hounded too. One female MP reported receiving antisemitic abuse on Twitter.

It is coarsening and unthinking. Much like England’s tactics against Iceland.

Which brings me back to the rest of Europe. One commentator this week said the British have always been the equivalent of the half-cut uncle at a wedding when it comes to EU meetings. Belligerent and not nearly as clever as he thinks he is.

How sweetly sorrowful was Danish European Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, speaking in perfect English on Radio 4’s Today programme yesterday morning but soon even she will move on as will the rest of the continent.

Not everyone will miss uncle at the next wedding.

So as the Three Lions go back to the drawing board yet again so must the country. We have to remain open, welcoming, not distrustful and certainly not anti-intellectual, for being able to think or attaining expert status in a field should be an aspiration not a crime.

I am sure England will recover its mojo but as for the football. Well that is an entirely different matter.

The Argus: England goalkepper Joe Hart 

I am sure I wasn’t alone in spotting another example of the deluded state of English football. At half time and with Iceland deservedly winning 2-1 the TV studio pundits turned to our goalkeeper’s howler for the second goal.

Should Joe Hart be dropped for the quarter finals asked the anchor. The only thing being dropped was the nation’s collective jaw at the suggestion that the team of strangers we had just witnessed bumping into each other for 45 minutes were about to sail into the next round.