As Sterling left St George’s Park, it seemed as if three years of painstaking work uniting the squad had been blown apart
And if it wasn’t for Gomez it would still be in tatters
I N T HE s we e p i n g b a r and r e s t a urant c o ncourse housed behind Wembley’s main stand there is a private area marked-out where the select few — families, friends, partners — with the correct wristbands can gather with England players after a game.
On Thursday night, after the 7-0 win over Montenegro and the qualification f o r Euro 2 0 2 0 , the mood should have been wholly celebratory.
But the sight of Joe Gomez’s close friends, parents and agent leaving as a group en masse to go down to a lower level of the stadium, rather than enjoy the conviviality of the bar, was an indication that all was not well with the evening.
England manager Gareth Southgate, who had extensive media duties, had taken the initiative to invite the Gomez family and friends to spend some time with the players after the 7-0 win.
It is typical of Southgate that he would engage with the Gomez family after the game. An England manager ideally would be a cross between Arrigo Sacchi and Oprah Wi n f r e y, a tactical genius infused with instinctive emotional intelligence.
Just as the most difficult week of his England managerial career was coming to a merciful end, with the team 6-0 up and Gomez about to come on the pitch on 70 minutes, Southgate would suddenly be required to deploy the full range of managerial skills again.
‘I wanted to get Joe on the pitch because I felt it was important to get both of them on the field, back in an England shirt, as we hadn’t got Joe into the games in September or October,’ Southgate would say later.
But the smattering of boos and catcalls that accompanied the entrance of Gomez meant something Southgate had hoped to draw a line under would now be reopened with gusto.
Gomez was bewildered to be cast as the villain of the week, even if there was an element of pantomime farce to the reaction of the Wembley crowd, growing bored with the ease of the victory and entertaining themselves with Mexican waves.
On Friday it got worse for Gomez. A clash of knees with Kieran Trippier in training meant he had to withdraw yesterday; as miserable a week as can be imagined.
With England, the football is only ever part of the equation. Ever since Bobby Moore was arrested in Colombia in the run up to Mexico 1970, allegedly for stealing a bracelet before being cleared, it has invariably been the celebrity drama that has entertained outsiders and sapped the spirit of the squad. Last week amplified that point.
THOSE present estimate that only around 15 of England’s staff and players were in the dining area when Gomez had reported for England training at the Hilton Hotel, St George’s Park on Monday night. Still, there were enough witnesses to ensure there was no hope of keeping what ensued under wraps. Though Gomez had only played the final few minutes of Liverpool’s crucial victory over
Manchester City the day before, that had still been enough time for a confrontation with Raheem Sterling.
The Liverpool player must have been buoyed by such a significant result but those familiar with what occurred in that private dining area say there was no gloating when Gomez offered his hand in greeting to Sterling, who was seated. What followed is the next 20 seconds would dominate the week. It may yet dominate the summer.
Sterling rose from his seat, raised his hands aggressively towards Gomez and seemingly attempted to grab his neck. The scar Gomez bears indicates significant contact was made.
‘You still the big man?’ he asked accusatorily, referring to their brief confrontation in the dying minutes of the Anfield clash.
Looking on, England team-mates laughed, assuming Sterling was j oking. Very quickly j oviality turned to incredulity at what they were witnessing. A fracas was ensuing, though Gomez wasn’t responding, more stunned than anything. Players intervened.
Harry Maguire and captain Harry Kane were quickly on the scene. There was a brief period of everyone being quietly shocked by what had occurred.
As all footballers will testify, such an exchange in the heat of training, with adrenaline pumping is entirely unremarkable. This was something extraordinary, however.
A team meeting was convened to discuss the matter. Southgate spoke to Sterling. The manager didn’t directly tell him to l eave but Sterling clearly felt that he ought to: either he felt he was no longer welcome or maybe his expulsion was coming anyway and it was better to pre-empt the decision.
Sterling was taken away from St George’s Park in one of the chauffeur-driven cars the FA has on standby for players. Some say he was gone for 20 minutes, others recall it being more like an hour. However long it was, in that time it must have felt as though three years of painstaking work rebuilding the England squad as a united force had been blown apart.
All those nights under canvas on Woodbury Common in Devon with the Royal Marines, all those teambonding sessions where players had revealed t heir emotional vulnerabilities and been able to empathise with each other’s background, must have seemed futile.
Ironically, Sterling was one of the players who had led the way when Southgate and Jonny Zneimer, the team psychologist in those early days, had i nstigated the team meetings in 2017.
Southgate, with long experience of dysfunctional England squads, had reckoned that establishing a team dynamic transcending club loyalties was essential if England were ever to achieve anything.
The work Southgate and Zneimer did back then was evident in the run to the World Cup semi-final in 2018. Clearly this was a team who enjoyed each other’s company, wholly unlike the previous golden generation.
Yet all that seemed undone. In the period of apparent chaos when Sterling had left t h e c a mp, Southgate looked as though he had stumbled off the tightrope he is required to walk balancing team discipline and maintaining personal relationships.
Had Sterling been banished from the squad — whether it was a selfimposed exile or not — it would have been hard to see how that fracture could easily have been repaired for next summer’s Euros.
At that stage the intervention of two Liverpool players was key — Go me z h i ms e l f and Jordan Henderson.
Gomez was 100 per cent the wronged party, as Sterling would later confirm in his supportive tweet after the Wembley booing. To some extent he held Sterling’s fate in his hands.
Had he not opted for forgiveness and magnanimity it would have been hard for Southgate to accept
Sterling back into the fold. Though shocked and l i terally scarred, Gomez made life much easier for Sterling by insisting he would not stand in the way of him returning, even as the City player’s car headed across the Derbyshire countryside towards his Cheshire home.
Henderson, not even at the camp at that stage — he was due to meet up later because he was suspended for the first game — was working the phones to talk his former Liverpool t eam- mate Sterling round and be a reconciler.
Henderson’s value to this squad and to Southgate has never been more apparent. Kane, Maguire and Fabian Delph were also crucial. They canvassed opinion from the rest of the squad, many of whom are very new to England duty.
Delph’s injury issues meant he wouldn’t hang around long this week. But it was very clear, in those moments, why Southgate still values and selects him. From the outside it looked as though England came close to falling apart on
Monday night. However, perhaps all those team meetings and the trip away with the Royal Marines ultimately did bear fruit.
Those with knowledge of the evening would say that, though severely tested, the leadership model Southgate has built and his insistence on the need to take responsibility just about held true. Sterling returned; the squad reconvened; apologies were made. However, only time will tell whether everyone is genuinely back onside.
The morning after, on Tuesday, England attempted to deal with the fall-out. Southgate, generally fluent and transparent, held an awkward press conference which raised more questions than it answered as he made his first attempt to draw a line under the affair. Players spoke up, Jordan Pickford among those willing to deal with the elephant in the room.
‘In life it’s normal you’re going to have your ups and downs, whether it’s at home or your club or with England,’ he said. ‘It’s about how you come out the other side.’ What was evident from Pickford and others is t hat, certainly until Monday, England duty had become fun again under Southgate.
‘I love coming away and spending time and working with the lads,’ added Pickford. ‘The team spirit is what drives us to be successful and that will always be the case.’
Pickford’s statement raises an important issue. Team spirit was the missing ingredient from the supremely talented generation that boasted Steven Gerrard, Frank Lampard, Ashley Cole, Gary Neville, Rio Ferdinand, Michael Owen and Wayne Rooney.
Speaking to members of that squad over recent months and this week, they would acknowledge that club boundaries were a significant factor in their underachievement.
Even if Southgate briefly lost control when Sterling left, it feels as though he regained it once the pl ayer had r et urned and t he sanction was imposed. Those who witnessed the incident insist it was the least he could do. A fragile unity had been restored.
BY Thursday night, with a 7-0 win under his belt, Southgate was in better form, even if he had the Gomez booing to deal with.
‘I’m incredibly close to all of the players and they are a very tight unit,’ he said. That day he had spoken with Sterling at length and insisted the player’s mood was good in anticipation of Kosovo today.
‘He’s looking forward to it,’ said Southgate. ‘You’re going to have moments as a manager with the players where they’ll be enamoured with you and where they’ll be less enamoured with you.
‘But we know we’ve been through enough already that the bonds are tight with the whole team. So we just have to ignore everything else and make sure the team stay tight, the team keep improving and we develop everybody as strong as we possibly can.’ Then came t he crunch question, the issue which Southgate must have wrestled with all week.
‘Sterling is essential to this team, isn’t he?’ Southgate was asked. He didn’t hesitate. ‘One hundred per cent,’ said the England manager. ‘ He’s one of the best players in Europe. I’m delighted for him tonight because he now knows that he’s going to get the chance to play in a European Championship where he can be one of the star players.’
That is the crux of the issue. Southgate had to do something. Yet managers and coaches involved with past England squads concede that the importance of the player to the team is always a factor when considering discipline.
England need Sterling, yet equally Sterling needs England if he is to become a global superstar.
The synergy between those two truths might just enable Southgate to traverse this crisis. There is a small chance England might win a major trophy this summer. No-one wants to jeopardise that.