WAISTCOAT TO FLAK JACKET
He once stepped over garlands but these days England boss Southgate uses those feet to dodge grenades
THE waistcoat has gone, the flak jacket is on.
Not long ago, Gareth Southgate was mainly collecting garlands from his feet, now he is dodging grenades.
It was Southgate for Prime Minister at one stage and at least he now knows what it is like to field awkward questions.
After the serenity of his first three years in charge, the past 12 months have been spattered with controversy.
And as he prepared to take on Wales without his latest batch of Covidiots, Southgate has clearly reached a point where enough is enough when it comes to players who might think they have already made the big time just by playing a couple of games for England.
“Some of the young players do not have credit in the bank,” he said. “They have got to prove themselves and have got to realise it is an honour to play for England.”
For a coach who prides himself on the development of England’s precocious knot of talent, it was emphatic stuff.
In the grand scheme of recent events, the tribulations of an England football coach are, of course, trivial.
But the past 12 months have brought Southgate, even during the long coronavirus lay- off, issues that have clearly now snapped his patience.
A year ago James Maddison withdrew unwell from Southgate’s squad and then watched the match against the Czech Republic in a Leicester casino.
A small-time misdemeanour from a fringe character but a hint of things to come.
A month later, Raheem m
Sterling initiated a scrap with team-mate Joe Gomez in the canteen and, after the pandemic broke out, Kyle Walker and Jack Grealish set the template for flouting Covid- 19 regulations and guidelines.
Mason Greenwood and Phi l Foden marked their first senior experience by breaking BOTH squad rules and coronavirus rules.
Now Tammy Abraham, Ben Chilwell and Jadon Sancho have turned their noses up at the Rule of Six.
Oh, and not forgetting one of the stalwarts of his ‘ leadership group’, Harry Maguire, being done for aggravated assault, resisting
sistin arrest and attempted bribery on the Greek island of Mykonos – a conviction against which the Manchester United defender is appealing.
But it was the youngsters who have flagrantly flouted Covid- 19 rules who were in Southgate’s sights last night.
He spoke about a reluctance to get on a moral high horse and how the situation was complicated... but what was not complicated was his underlying message to young stars such as Greenwood, Foden, Abraham and Sancho. Which was this.
Do NOT distract the rest of the squad and myself from the job we are trying to do – win
Euro 2020. By being big-time Charlies, do NOT jeopardise the fans’ goodwill that has taken us years to earn.
Referring to some of his young players, he declared: “They’ve got to realise they’ve done nothing yet, they’ve done nothing with us, they’ve got it all to prove.”
Well said. And when Southgate extended his feeling of dissatisfaction to the current national response to the crisis, it was a reminder to those young players they should pull together like everyone else.
“We need to get back on track working together,” Southgate declared. “There is a lot of disharmony now and we are all in this situation together. We have got to work together to pull through it as a country.”
Good old Gareth. He might, one day, make a Prime Minister after all.