England's glorious European revolution took a faltering step this week, at least in the UEFA Cup, as their three remaining participants, Everton, Tottenham Hotspur and Bolton Wanderers, all crashed out.

Bolton had no-one to blame but themselves after resting nearly a full team's worth of players to concentrate on their relegation dogfight in the English Premier League but Spurs and Everton both overcame first leg deficits and looked very good value to progress until they hit the English brick wall of the penalty shoot out.

With so many foreign players on display in the English domestic game these days I really can't understand why the old problem, usually displayed by the English national team, of bowing out of cup competitions at the first hint of a penalty shoot out still remains.

Both Spurs and Everton missed two vital penalties in their respective shoot outs against PSV Eindhoven and Fiorentina but only one each of their penalty missers was an Englishman, Jermain Jenas for Tottenham and Phil Jagielka for Everton. Could the Nigerian Yakubu and the Frenchman Pascal Chimbonda, the other unlucky takers, have been struck down by the English curse or has memories of Chris Waddle in Italia 90, Gareth Southgate at Euro 96 and many others beside in an England jersey warped out perception of English sides' inability to win games from the penalty spot?