SO, WHAT’S ROY BEEN UP TO SINCE ICELAND?
Roy Hodgson is back in the spotlight, 15 months after resigning from England, somewhat through the trapdoor.
And although his position has been side of stage since, he has never slid entirely from view. The 70-year- old has maintained a presence in football ever since that excruciating defeat by Iceland at Euro 2016 and has influenced appointments elsewhere. As a close friend of Norwich owners Delia Smith and Michael Wynn- Jones, Hodgson was consulted in March over whether the club should create a role of sporting director.
Having worked in that structure to good effect on the continent and at West Bromwich Albion, he relayed a positive opinion. Smith even suggested Hodgson might accept the post, but he was set on a return to management and Stuart Webber was recruited instead.
Job offers rolled in from abroad. Hodgson was headhunted by the Chinese Super League, with power-brokers willing to offer an £8million-ayear salary — more than double his £ 3.5m FA wage. Last December he told BBC Radio 5 Live he had been ‘ scarred’ by the way his reign as national manager ended. ‘ Where grieving is involved, do you ever really get over it? I don’t know.’
He also said he felt good and ‘if an offer comes along which is the right one for me, and the club, then I shall be happy to take it’.
The approach by Norwich came at around the same time as Leicester sounded him out after sacking Claudio Ranieri. Hodgson met Leicester chiefs for an informal chat but nothing progressed.
In April, Hodgson took up a secondment to Australia in an advisory role to assist A-League club Melbourne City. He spent time with coaches at the club, a month-long stay set up by friend and City Football Group executive Brian Marwood.
Hodgson got TV punditry work for beIN Sports, travelling to Doha for the Confederations Cup, and in July he flew even further, to talk at the Sport Business Summit in Beijing.
But his focus remained on getting a No 1 gig again. He rejected the chance to appear on Strictly
Come Dancing (‘I’d have been another Ed Balls’) and bought a flat in Richmond with his wife Sheila, vowing to complete a ‘mandatory 10,000 steps’ daily, while also shedding a few kilos with gym work-outs. A voracious reader, he told The Big Issue in March that
A Fairy Tale of New York by JP Donleavy is his favourite book and explained his philosophy on navigating London. ‘I don’t want to travel in a chauffeurdriven car because it’s not me, it’s not my background and it’s not what I could get used to.’
Now Palace will hope he can get used to them.