Many protagonists at this tournament are players who had to move overseas to further their careers. Faced with a choice of learning to become better footballers with clubs abroad or staying close to friends, family and familiarity at home, they chose football. Too few English players make that same choice.
Take Luis Suarez, scorer of both Uruguay goals that sent England packing. At 19, he moved to the Netherlands to play football and improve. Edinson Cavani, whose delightful cross set up Suarez's first goal against England, also hadn't celebrated his 20th birthday when he moved to Italy.
Mario Balotelli, the scorer of Italy's winner against England, moved to Manchester. Costa Rica, which stunned everyone except itself by qualifying top of the England-Italy-Uruguay group, got its first goal in Brazil from well-travelled striker Joel Campbell, who before his 22nd birthday later this week has already played for clubs in France, Spain and Greece.
England players, by comparison, are stick-in-the-muds. All but one of Roy Hodgson's squad of 23 play in England. The exception, reserve goalkeeper Fraser Forster, didn't stray far: he's with Celtic in Scotland. This is surely part of the reason why England players often seem to travel so poorly compared to more worldly-wise rivals with broader horizons from other nations.
The English island mentality was also on display in the FA's proposals for arresting the decline of the national squad. Pulling up the drawbridge, it proposed stricter limits on the numbers of foreign players coming to England.
