Didn't take long for the mention of Scotland not qualifying and that's fair enough but the problem is even when all the home nations were in, the media focus was on Eng-er-lund - John Motson and Jimmy Hill always had to mention England in some form or another. Whether it was the last time they played one or both teams currently playing, or maybe how many of the officials were from England or perhaps even that one of the teams playing were at the '66 World Cup just so they could get that in. Thankfully it's reduced since those two have gone off but even your fellow countryman notice how often it slips into the talk and commentary even today. The ITV and BBC are broadcasting to the whole of the UK not just England, notice that other home countries tend to say the country name and not "we" when talking about the team. This is why ABE is so big and is nothing to do with our team being there or not.
And haha no the whole Independence "thing" isn't us going waaah waaah at all, it's about wanting to take more control over our own and that's it. A number of people want to hear Westminster say devo-max is ours if we say 'No' and job will be a good'un however if they wait till near the day and say it, it won't go down well and a good amount who were on the fence will just say Yes. There is also a growing feeling of let's go for it and see what happens, you may not hear about it but it is around, most recent I heard it myself was between staff in a shop in which a member of the public jumped in too and said "it cud be good, it cud be bad but if we don't gie it a try, we'll never know". I liked that and it makes sense.
You remind me of the comedian who said the "Better Together" campaigners are not even delivering that message as all they seem to be doing is telling Scotland how they will be "worse apart". You want to sound like you are putting across valid and important points but actually all that's coming across is "you need us" in a heavily condescending manner.
Anyway I thought you weren't into this that much, so why would you even know what we're talking about in regards to how the media makes everyone but England hate the England team?