Gareth Southgate is an England manager for our times. Appointed as a caretaker eight years ago, he has earned the right to permanent respect as one of Britain’s sporting greats.
Even if he doesn’t quite manage to lead the men’s England team to win their first ever European Championship on Sunday evening, in doing so giving them their first major trophy since 1966, he has already made history by taking them to their first final on foreign soil.
Of course, it is only a game, but it is also a spectacle and a national obsession. It affects how we see ourselves and how others see us – just remember the elation that greeted the Lionesses’ spectacular tournament win in 2022. Mr Southgate thus speaks for the nation, as well as being an administrator, tactician and sports psychologist.
He is like a politician, not just in speaking for the nation, but in that everyone thinks they could do his job better than he can. He is, though, a good fit as the nation’s counsellor. “We live in what’s been an angry country,” he said on Saturday, the day before the Euro 2024 final. “I would love that to be different as we move forward. Hopefully we can bring some temporary happiness.”
He is right that we live in a country where there is too much anger simmering beneath the surface. He is right, too, that if England win against Spain in Berlin, against the odds, it will bring only “temporary” happiness. But, win or lose, he deserves praise for a sustained gain not just in the quality of English football but in the quality of our national life.
And by national life, we mean life for everyone in the United Kingdom, not just in England. One of the places where there was too much anger, in this case visible above the surface, was on the front page of The National, the Scottish pro-independence newspaper. Its headline was: “Time for revenge! Our message to Spain: Save us from an England win (or we’ll never hear the end of it!).” So much for the friendly nationalism of partnership with England that Alex Salmond, the former first minister, once promised. We believe that, fortunately, most people in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland share in the joy of England’s success.
So they should, because success for a part is success for the whole – a good motto for the sports field. Mr Southgate spoke on Saturday of his feeling that he is in “a position of responsibility”. He said: “I never wanted to impose my values on people. But I think there are some fundamental human values that, if you get the chance to model them, then you should.”
That is what he has done, and in that he has shown leadership. He has been criticised by a minority in the country for turning the England team into social justice warriors, but those critics have helped define a team that takes pride in its social conscience. The players are only incredibly well-paid athletes, after all, but the team spirit instilled by Mr Southgate has given them a sense of higher purpose.
As Richard Jolly, our senior football correspondent, writes: “Southgate has made a greater impact than is often acknowledged. He is underestimated; by the rest of Europe, perhaps, amid some scathing verdicts, but also by many in the England support.”
He has rebranded patriotism, “with thoughtfulness, inclusivity and an emotional intelligence that contributes to his understanding of his players”. He may not be an instinctive managerial genius, “but he is a careful planner who has learnt”.
Inevitably, commentators have compared him to Sir Keir Starmer, for whom a win in Berlin would be the cherry on the top of a huge election victory and a successful first nine days in government. “They are both cautious, pragmatic men from the home counties,” wrote Jason Cowley, the editor of the New Statesman. “Their speech patterns and diction have a certain low-toned flatness. Their lack of radicalism and charisma have been repeatedly noted by their detractors.”
And yet they have both succeeded when failure seemed the more likely outcome. They, and their teams, have a likeability about them that seems modest, refreshing and hopeful.
Whatever the result in Berlin, Mr Southgate and the England team have already done us proud, throughout the UK.
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