The Summer of 2010 has been an inconsistent one for Britain's National Spill Team.

With 2009 spill highlights including Amy Winehouse's dignity and Susan Boyle's chins, most fans and critics alike anticipated a winning record in the '10 season.

Then, on April 24, 2010, the wheels came off. A deep water oil platform owned by British Petroleum sprang a leak, covering one of the world's largest non-oceanic bodies of water in a 10,000 square mile oil slick. 

"It was a rough start," admits British figurehead and part-time corpse Queen Elizabeth II. "The Beckham spill in 2007 was just cheeky fun, wasn't it? No birds died, no enormous southern man-children emerged from the tidewater covered in crude. Indeed, this was a true calamity, and we knew we'd have to spill something really nice on America if we were to salvage the season."

After debating a gift bag including Ricky Gervais and Russell Brand, it was decided that while awesome, these would be considered somewhat insincere.

After 52 days of debate, on June 12, the House of Lords passed a resolution amounting to the ultimate act of English penance - one free goal in the World Cup. Death row inmate Robert Green, the most hated man in England, was sentenced to bear the gift, and the rest is history.