THE Sun decided to fully embrace the Little Englander stereotype for its front page today – and not everyone was a fan.
The paper splashed with a picture of Harry Kane ahead of Colombia playing England in the World Cup.
Accompanying text read: "As 3 Lions face nation that gave world Shakira, great coffee and er, other stuff, we say.. GO KANE!"
"Go Kane!" because it sounds like "cocaine", and that's obviously all those South American countries are about, right?
Colombia's ambassador to the UK, Néstor Osorio Londoño, wasn't too amused.
“It’s rather sad that they use such a festive and friendly environment as the World Cup to target a country and continue to stigmatise it with a completely unrelated issue,” he said.
“Respect, fair play and joy for the game is all that matters tonight. We’ll be cheering for Colombia and hoping we can all enjoy a great match.”
In fact, he'll be hosting a party for Colombian fans in a traditional English pub to celebrate the match.
A spokesman for The Sun told the Guardian that the front page was "suitably light-hearted considering the context".
They said: "Like the ambassador, we’re looking forward to a good game tonight against a great footballing nation."
What might be more in the spirit of the World Cup would be highlighting Colombia's many positive traits – such as its World Heritage sites – rather than perpetuating harmful myths that will deter important tourism...
We at The National also hope for a good match – and perhaps karma could do us a favour.
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