How to handle a World Cup semi-final week
GARETH SOUTHGATE will have felt exhilarated when he woke this morning, as the week of all weeks begins. This is everything he has ever worked for and his simple, unambiguous aim now must be for his England team to seize an incredible opportunity. Coaches who were also decent players first dream of winning a World Cup on the field themselves and, if you turn to coaching, you count yourself very lucky and privileged to get another bite of the cherry. That’s the happy situation Gareth finds himself in and I hope he enjoys every last second of what will be an incredible week, whatever transpires. As an international coach, there are no rules, although the foundations of your beliefs and methods must be in place. And as you get higher up the ladder, the wise coach trusts in those more and more. You must do it your way because you will be judged solely on your tournament record. Gareth will be feeling immense pride, a little relief and will be incredibly grateful for those who have helped him along the way — family, mentors, colleagues — but he is such a realist that he will know the job isn’t even half-done yet. He will know that he must treat Croatia on Wednesday as England’s World Cup final. For the time being, nothing else matters. Over the next three days, the eyes of the world will be on him — and the eyes of his squad and backroom staff. He has set the tone from day one with his honesty, decency and no-nonsense approach. He has also thrown in lashings of common sense and humour. He allows his team some down time with family and friends and a beer here and there after a match (I’m all for that) and he knows exactly when it’s time to switch on. He treats his team like adults and they have repaid him with their maturity. This is an incredibly tight-knit group and it stems from the entire squad’s total trust in the man in charge and his methods. They will be looking to him all week. Nerves will be jangling — of course they will — and it could spook players if ‘the gaffer’ suddenly changes his approach or demeanour in any way. But he won’t. We are talking Gareth Southgate here. He is not a man for histrionics, sudden mood swings, outrageous claims or hyperbole. There will be no radical switches in tactics or snap decisions over players. He answers questions intelligently and will sidestep mentions of winning the tournament. He does not try to wind up the opposition, in fact he is generous in his praise. There is more than one way to skin a cat. He has given opposition teams nothing to whinge about or get angry about. Seeing him go about his business as normal will settle his youngish squad. There is no need to ‘work’ them unduly this week. England are formidably fit and injury-free and everybody deserves huge praise for that. They are in the groove. Change nothing, although I trust somebody at the FA or within his management team has been delegated to look after ticket requests for the friends and extended family of players. That really can be a distraction. Southgate’s attitude must be that reaching the last four of a World Cup is a validation of everything England have done so far. You don’t reach the semi-finals by accident. Germany, Argentina, Portugal, Brazil — with players of the calibre of Cristiano Ronaldo, Lionel Messi and Neymar — are all at home or on the beach. Italy and Holland didn’t even reach the finals. England have progressed smoothly to the semi-finals in a stellar year, in arguably the best and strongest World Cup of modern times. Only with daily penalty practice would I bring any real intensity on to the practice field — they must be full on, England must be ready for that scenario again. The rest of the time I would opt for virtual walk-throughs and brief tactical discussions. Just engage the mind rather than the body and make sure everybody is on the same page. We can all sleep easy knowing that Gareth has these bases covered.