Now all of England is on fire. The pessimism of 11 months ago had already given way to guarded optimism but after the extraordinary events here on Saturday night English joy has, for the moment at least, good reason to be unconfined.
Beating the Germans at football always did lift the nation's hearts. Beating them 5-1 in Germany will have come close to blowing the nation's minds. This was ecstasy in spades.
For 35 years England have lived on the tale of the day a World Cup was won against West Germany at Wembley. Shortly before the countries met in the Olympic Stadium here to contest automatic qualification for the 2002 tournament Geoff Hurst was on Germ an television recalling his hat-trick.
From now on talk of hat-tricks against Germany will revolve more around Michael Owen, each of whose goals on Saturday certainly crossed the line. Having wrought havoc in the Bayern Munich defence for Liverpool in the Super Cup in Monaco, Owen returned to Bayern's home ground to give Muncheners the full Monte. As gaps in Rudi Voller's awful defence yawned he simply tore along the dotted lines.
"For me Michael Owen has something very special," enthused Sven-Goran Eriksson, whose stock as England's coach is now in the upper stratosphere. "He's a good footballer and his technique is excellent but he also has two things which are difficult to find in a player. He's very cold when he gets a chance and he's very quick. When you have that combination it's a killer."
David Beckham, groin strain forgotten, commanded an England performance as he had never done before. Equally crucial were the tactically adroit performances of Steven Gerrard and Paul Scholes who denied Germany the mastery of the midfield which they had been so meekly allowed at Wembley last October, when Dietmar Hamann ran the match and scored its only goal.
That Germany victory, a swift revenge for England's 1-0 win in Charleroi that had bundled them out of the European Championship, begat Kevin Keegan's resignation and the glum scoreless draw in Finland under Howard Wilkinson which finally persuaded the Football Association to look abroad for the next man to run the national squad.
Eriksson always did seem a sound choice by the FA; now the appointment has taken on the touch of genius. England, three points behind with a game in hand, can finish only level with Germany in Group Nine if Germany win their last game against Finland but crucially Eriksson's side are four in front on goal difference and will still go through automatically if first place has to be decided on the head-to-heads. Of course they still have to beat Albania in Newcastle on Wednesday and Greece at Old Trafford on October 6th. Even in the heady aftermath of Saturday's match Eriksson tried to keep a sense of proportion.
"After a victory like this there is always a danger of thinking that you can put out a shoe or a foot or a leg just to win a game," he said. "The game on Wednesday is not so glamorous, so tomorrow we must try to forget this victory and be focused on Albania. It would be a small disaster if we beat Germany away and then lose to Albania at home. Then this victory tonight would be worthless, more or less."
Those are wise words, though it is hard to imagine his cool England team being carried away even by Saturday's historic win: the first time Germany have ever lost in Munich, only their second home defeat in World Cup qualifiers, their heaviest to England at full international level and the most dramatic turnaround in a return bout involving German opposition since Joe Louis battered Max Schmelling to a jelly.
On Saturday Germany's defence suffered a similarly nightmarish, if less physically painful, experience. When in the sixth minute Carsten Jancker punished some ball-watching by the England defence, prodding the ball past Seaman after Oliver Neuville's header had surprised Sol Campbell and Rio Ferdinand, some bad memories came floating back.
In event the sloppiness of falling behind merely made the manner of England's recovery even more impressive. Eriksson's plan was to exploit the narrowness of Voller's back three by getting Gary Neville and Ashley Cole into the spaces behind the German wing-backs, Marko Rehmer and Jorg Bohme, while Owen and Emile Heskey advanced through the inside-forward channels.
Chronically inept German defending played its part but so did England's character. "I think the reason why we came back into the game was that our players believe we have a really good team and that we can do good things," Eriksson reflected. "If you don't believe that it doesn't matter how good you are. These things must always start in the head.
"I told the players before they went out on the pitch that, if you play football as you can, we can beat anyone. If we want to play as we did against Holland (to whom England recently lost 2-0 in a friendly at White Hart Lane) we can lose against anyone. Either way it's very easy. But if we can go on like this in important games we can lose a friendly now and then, it doesn't matter."
Eriksson pointed to the shot rifled into the left-hand corner of the German net by Gerrard in first-half stoppage time as the crucial moment in England's victory. "To go in leading 2-1 instead of drawing 1-1 was a great difference both for us and for them."
Owen's equaliser in the 12th minute, a sharp volley after Gary Neville's forward header had caught the defence moving out too late and left Nick Barmby onside when he nodded the ball square to the Liverpool striker, might still have been dashed by offside against other England players, but the flag stayed down.
On another night Sebastian Deisler might have scored a crucial goal at a crucial time for Germany instead of dragging the ball wide and just before Gerrard's goal Seaman made his most important save, keeping out a low snap shot from Bohme.
Although England needed only two minutes of the second half to increase their lead, Beckham's sharp centre enabling Emile Heskey to nod Owen through for his second goal, how different might things have been had Jancker not directed a free header the wrong way just before the hour.
Once Gerrard had neatly dispossessed Michael Ballack before setting up Owen's hat-trick, to be followed by Beckham and Scholes combining to send Heskey through a thoroughly dilapidated and depressed German defence for England's fifth goal, the Olympic Stadium was emptying in droves.
Long before the end the German supporters did not think it was all over. They knew.
So now England and their Coles are bound for Newcastle, where a warmer welcome than usual awaits Owen at the court of St James.
GERMANY (3-4-1-2): Kahn; Worns (Asamoah, 46min), Nowotny, Linke; Rehmer, Hamann, Ballack (Klose, 66), Bohme; Deisler; Jancker, Neuville (Kehl, 77).
ENGLAND (4-4-2): Seaman; G Neville, Campbell, Ferdinand, Ashley Cole; Beckham, Gerrard (Hargreaves, 77), Scholes (Carragher, 82), Barmby (McManaman, 64); Heskey, Owen.
Referee: P Collina (Italy).
Attendance: 63,000.
