Roll up! Roll up! Don’t be shy! Its time to take part in the great national pastime of sneering

A strong position looks considered, sorted-out and, above all, aggressive. But it is, in fact, defensive. You don’t build a castle to attack from. My list is unassailable. It spurns weakness. It adds up to an entrenched position. Areas of potential weakness have been scrupulously avoided wherever possible, brilliantly minimised wherever not possible. That is how you build a castle.

Enthusiasm. That is a serious potential weakness, especially when discussing sport. Enthusiasm is blood-brother to naivety and nothing is worse than naivety if you wish to appear wise. (Please note that I didn’t say be wise.) So here is my advice: ditch enthusiasm. Join the sneerers. Join the mockers. And you will always be wise or, at least, considered so. Here’s how to do it.

Lesson 1: Sven. Eriksson, the England head coach, is by definition the softest target in English sport. Unless he wins the World Cup, he is a failure. And he almost certainly isn’t going to win the World Cup. So sneer. It’s an issue you’ll always be right about.

An England friendly provides a perfect opportunity. Eriksson doesn’t play them as proper matches. It is his method. If he were a racehorse trainer, he would be fined for schooling his horse in public. If you are wise, you don’t watch friendlies. If you wish to appear wise, you watch them and sneer.

Eriksson has made mistakes, but very few in real qualifying matches. He is on his third qualification campaign and it would take something remarkable for this one to be any less successful than his first two. Alas, his England side consistently loses its nerve at the very highest level: against Brazil (World Cup quarter-finals, 2002), France (European Championship group match, 2004) and Portugal (European Championship quarter-finals, 2004).

That is a very good record, but it is ultimately disappointing. It demonstrates that Eriksson and his playing resources are not quite as good as we hoped. The answer, then, is not to hope. Instead, blame the coach. Not in anger, but with a sneer.

Lesson 2: Tim. Henman is, by a distance, the finest male tennis player this country has produced in well over half a century. He has consistently been ranked in the world’s top ten, he has made the Wimbledon semis on four occasions, the quarters on four more, and last year reached the semis at the French and the US Open.

But he hasn’t won Wimbledon. He hasn’t won a grand-slam tournament. He is worse than a failure: he is a disappointment. The best way to protect yourself from disappointment is to abandon hope before the start and sneer. Henman is defined not by his successes but by the annual disappointment he brings to the nation.

Sneer at Henman. It’s a very safe option. There are 127 other players at Wimbledon: the chances are that one of them will beat him this year. It’s a way to be wise, a way to guard against enthusiasm. And crucially, it’s a way to guard against disappointment.

Lesson 3: the England cricket team. England have just lost a one-day series and they face an Ashes summer, so it is open season for sneering. Never mind that in the past half-dozen years England have risen from the bottom of the Test-match rankings to second. The fact is that England lost too many matches for too long. The habit of sneering has gone too deep.

Any cheerful remark about the England cricket team smacks of naivety of the most absurd kind, as if the stars were God’s daisy-chain and every time a baby laughs a wee fairy is born. England have a very good Test team. But don’t for God’s sake say so: point out that they will get hammered by Australia in the summer. And don’t let anyone tell you that these two matters are not mutually exclusive.

Lesson 4: the England rugby team. Going through a very sticky rebuilding and so ripe for the sneering. Back in the Eighties, it was wise to sneer about them. Then they started winning grand slams, which was a problem. But then they started missing grand slams a few years ago and sneering was again de rigueur. Then they won the World Cup, which spoilt things completely. But it’s all right now. Sneer. Get it in quick, before they win the World Cup again.

Lesson 5: Ellen. The first time MacArthur went round the world on her own, the nation was entranced. But to be entranced a second time would be enthusiastic: worse, naive. So let us instead sneer at her self-pitying whinges to camera: “It’s so hard! I’ve dug so deep!”

The idea is to imply, rather than state (which would be ridiculous), that her self-pity diminishes her achievement. Just caricature her as a whingeing woman doing the housework (admittedly up the top of a 75ft mast in a gale in the Southern Ocean). MacArthur has done something extraordinary. What can the wise person do but sneer?

Lesson 6: London Olympics. To support London’s bid for the 2012 Games would be naff. It would be to become a Henman Hillite, a Last Night of the Proms patriot. Best tip: be worldly and speak of your globe-trotter’s acquaintance with Madrid’s organisational flair, the charm of Parisian hoteliers, the knowledge of New York taxi drivers. We all hate London; either because we live there, or because Londoners live there.

London is not the favourite, so that gives sneerers a great opportunity. And if it wins, it will give everyone an unmatched opportunity for a seven-year whinge during the preparations, while the sneerers say: “I told you so.” And do you know something? That’s exactly what happened in Sydney. Until the day the greatest Games in history opened.

Sneer, then. Sneer by all means. Sneer at Sven, sneer at Ellen, sneer at beach volleyball in Horse Guards Parade and archery at Lord’s. And while you’re at it, sneer at this column. Sneer at birds, sneer at horses, sneer at poetry, sneer at whisky, sneer at children, sneer at women, sneer at men, sneer at sex, sneer at life. Join the mockers and be safe. That, after all, is what wise people do.