Squad Numbers

In my last post, I said that Gareth Southgate was a genius, and said that he was the best England manager of all time. Admittedly, that doesn’t look great now after the loss to Spain, but I stand by it.

No England manager has a better record than Southgate, in terms of win percentage and also record in terms of progression in tournaments. Southgate’s worst ever tournament was the Qatar World Cup in 2022, where they were eliminated in the Quarter Final by France, a team that was one Randal Kolo Muani shot away from winning the whole tournament.

No other country has been as consistent as England in the Southgate era. England under Southgate have reached 1 quarter final, 1 semi final and 2 finals. That is an incredible record and is a testament to the job that Southgate has done. When Southgate came into the job, England were in turmoil, they had just come off the back of Sam Allardyce’s (short lived) reign and more pertinently the Roy Hodgson era, in which they were knocked out of the 2014 World Cup in the group stage, following a dire, lifeless 0-0 draw with Costa Rica. They then had the infamous 0-1 loss to Iceland in the Round of 16 of Euro 2016. It was a mess. Infact, before 2018, Southgate’s first tournament in charge, you have to go all the way back to 2006 to find a tournament in which England made it past the first knock out round.

An argument that has often been made about Southgate is that he has better players now than England teams of the past have had. First of all, England are no mugs, and never have been, they just haven’t been able to find the right balance in the past but now there are so many younger players thriving for England, Southgate has revolutionized the pathway for young players, and the step from youth teams to the senior squad isn’t that huge, and players can focus more on showing what they are capable of than shying away at the sight of the bright lights and huge stars. Don’t take it from me, take it from Steve Cooper, who coached England U17’s to a World Cup victory in 2017

“We needed to make sure we stayed ahead of the curve. It was an important time -the DNA was implemented and it covered everything from top to bottom. Initially, it was the under-21s. Players were desperate to come and play for England. The under-21s tournaments are in the middle of June and that could be difficult for players but they were crawling to come. Gareth has taken that into the senior side. Everyone underneath that, we could then look at the top of the tree with Gareth and the senior team and see everything was becoming aligned.”

Southgate has experience working with younger players, as he himself coached the under 21’s side before making the jump to the senior team, he is relatable, and the players trust him, just as he trust’s them. The players want to play for England, and they want to play for him, that is a fact which cannot be scoffed at, as that was very much not the case in the past. The players do not feel the pressure, the weight of the shirt as they used, this a huge part as to why England have been so much more successful in recent times.

This is the thing which is forgotten about when there is discourse over the England job, it’s not as simple as picking a coach who will play attractive, front foot football, the role of England manager is much more than that, it’s managing people, an organisation and the media. Cooper spoke about how Southgate “alligned” the organisation, and that is so important, and not something that many other candidates could do.

Speaking about front foot football, the discourse around England’s playing style is borderline insane, Micah Richards said on the BBC: “We have a manager who has been successful being defensive, getting into a semi-final of a World Cup and two Euros [finals], and we’ve not been able to push this team forward in the way it deserves. That’s no slight on Gareth Southgate, that’s just his tactics. Now we have to move forward in the right direction and play the football these players play at club level.” Richards has completely contradicted himself here, he said that “we’ve not been able to push the team forward” whilst also listing out England’s exceptional record under Southgate, and references that i’s “just his tactics” whilst inadvertently showing us that those tactics work.

Rio Ferdinand said after the game: “We said after the group stage that if you’re going to play on the conservative side of things, with the amount of talent we have in this squad, you have to win.”

England do not HAVE to win, that’s not how football works, just because you have a good team of individuals, or even are a well drilled, well coached team doesn’t mean that you winning is a must. Look at Germany, they played some of the best football of the tournament, what do they have to show for it? A quarter final exit. It’s amazing that people such as Ferdinand, a top player, who has played for England at tournaments (and not done as well as the current group of players) can speak about football in this way.

If you strip it all back, England were possibly a few centimetres away from winning back to back Euros, a feat that only Spain have ever achieved. Had Marcus Rashford’s penalty in the shootout against Italy 3 years ago crept the other side of the post, or Marc Guehi’s header which was cleared off the line crept over the line, we would be living in a reality where Southgate is paraded as one of the greatest international managers of all time, and certainly England’s most successful. Football is a game of fine margins, and unfortunately for England, it hasn’t gone their way, and they haven’t got over the line, yet.

The myth that England can magically play Guardiola esque football is wrong on every level. England have shown a willingness to try and play positively throughout the tournament, but they also realize that pragmatism is important. Spain are the exception to the rule, most other successful nations play the pragmatic football which we have seen from England. The clamour for England to “take the shackles off” and “let the players thrive” is ridiculous, as every player that Southgate has used in this tournament has thrived, a testament to his coaching, and the people who clamour for the likes of Cole Palmer to start, are the same people who complain about Southgate trying to shoehorn all his best players into a team whilst not being in their most natural roles.

Spain are an exceptional team, the best team in the tournament by far, and England gave them a run for their money, that shouldn’t be taken for granted. Croatia, Italy, Germany and France were all beaten by Spain in this tournament, and they were the deserving winners, the fact that it was as close run affair as it was shows the magnitude of England’s achievement.

So far I haven’t talked about the Spain game too much, but there was one problem with what happened in the match. The performance was fine, they kept the game tight, and after 73 minutes, the score was 1-1, Cole Palmer had just equalised, at this point, England had all the momentum and it felt as if the tide was changing, England had the power off the bench, and were piling on the pressure. What happens next? They throw it all away. From Cole Palmer’s goal to the full time whistle, Jordan Pickford touched the ball 9 times, 2 of which were passes to Kyle Walker, and 7 of which were long ball’s, none of which were accurate. It was this which killed England in that game, they lost all their momentum, as their creative players couldn’t get on the ball, and we just continuously gave the ball to Spain. Surely, this wasn’t coached by Southgate, that would be nonsensical. It was a high pressure moment, I accept that, and decision making can be drastically affected by nerves, and Pickford does seem the anxious type, but had England kept the ball on the ground, they could have got a stranglehold on the game, and I could have been writing a completely different blog right now.

A new manager might win England a tournament and end the 58 (ongoing) years of hurt, but so might Southgate, he has done an exceptional job and has just missed out in the finals, the ball just hasn’t dropped to the right player at the right time. You can ask for change, but I’ll say this, a wise old man once said “These fans have been spoiled in recent times” That wise old man got a lot of hate for that quote, and rightly so, but that same wise old man was once in charge of England, and things were a lot worse back then than they are, you can twist if you want, but what we have right now is pretty good.