Eight years is a long time in football. Eight years is long enough for people to run out of patience. Eight years is long enough that the successes no longer generate quite such goodwill, that the flaws and foibles annoy all the more.
A rattiness was evident in the group stage of the Euros just gone. There was an impatience, a sense of irritation on all sides. Better to go now than to let it fester, to let those complaints about the environment being created fester into something far more toxic following, say, a goalless draw against Honduras in the second game of the World Cup.
But these have been eight extraordinary years for England. It says everything about the changes Gareth Southgate wrought that he has left his successor a hugely difficult legacy: now there is expectation, now people think England should be winning tournaments. Which, when you consider where England were when he took over in 2016, is a remarkable achievement.
England had lost to Iceland at the Euros, but that was only the culmination of a miserable decade. They’d been drab at the World Cup in 2006 even if they did reach the quarter-final. They’d failed to qualify for the Euros in 2008. They’d been terrible at the World Cup in 2010, the Euros in 2012 and the World Cup in 2014, when they were eliminated after two games. For a decade there hadn’t even been the solace of a dramatic exit, even penalties had lost their sting. They happened. England lost.
Then there was Sam Allardyce’s one-game reign, the “pint of wine” and the Telegraph “sting”. Southgate was initially appointed as an interim, the only available figure. But it turned out that served him well. He was the model of the accidental English hero, a Richard Hannay figure, thrust reluctantly into the action, and dealing with it with great dignity, modesty and sang-froid. That’s why people still picture him in the waistcoat, six years after he stopped wearing it.
His appointment may not have been planned, may have been an emergency measure, but it turned out Southgate was the perfect candidate. He had helped craft the England DNA programme, which is to a large extent responsible for their glut of high-class creators. He had been the manager of the under-21s. He knew what the emerging generation expected and what was expected of them.
There is a myth about Southgate that he was too loyal, that he lacked steel. It’s nonsense: for his first tournament squad, he dropped Joe Hart and Wayne Rooney, preferring Jordan Pickford, Dele Alli and Jesse Lingard. He has always had a ruthless streak. The Russia World Cup was fun. There was a win on penalties, England’s first in a World Cup and only their second in tournaments. There was, unthinkably, a first tournament semi-final since 1996. He had made England relevant again.
England have got through 18 knockout games in major tournaments, nine of them have come in the past eight years. It’s true that the expansion of tournaments means the quality in some of those games is less than it once would have been, but England have reached three semi-finals under him having reached four before (one of which was the 1968 Euros, which entailed nothing more than winning the Home International Championship). Two of England’s three finals have come under Southgate.
That’s not to say there can’t be criticism. He was slow to react to Croatia taking control of midfield in the semi-final in 2018. He could have reacted quicker to Italy’s resurgence in the Euro 2020 final, which stands now as the great opportunity missed. But those are details – vital details, admittedly – at a level of achievement few other England managers have reached.
Southgate showed there is still a place for experts, for patient and meticulous preparation. He has, for now at least, slain the dragon of penalties, practice and the various psychological ploys meaning England’s shootout against Switzerland was as professional and as clinical as you’re ever likely to see. That’s not to say England will always win shootouts, because other teams also have their preparation, but at least there is no longer a sense, as once there was, that they end inevitably in defeat.
That’s where this last tournament stands apart from the other three. The preparation was not as good. The central midfield issue had not been settled in advance, and that, plus the absence of a left-footed left-back, Harry Kane’s immobility and the decision to advance Jude Bellingham had knock-on effects to the balance of the side.
The shape was changed mid-tournament; there was a sense of doing it all on the fly. In that sense it all felt like old England, how it was before the McClaren-Capello-Hodgson drought, scrambling through the tournament. Which is why, perhaps, this was the time to say goodbye; it’s testament to his diplomatic skills that he understood that.
All England managers are criticised and Southgate certainly did not escape that. But as the dust settles, his place in the pantheon is clear. Sir Alf Ramsey remains top, the visionary who changed the tactics of a nation and won the World Cup, and there is a gap to Southgate, but the gap behind him is almost as distinct. He led England to two finals and, more importantly, changed the culture. It’s perhaps in the coming months and years that the scale of his achievement will truly be recognised.
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