David Dein, the Football Association international ambassador, wants Gareth Southgate to stay on as England manager – but even if he does step down the former Arsenal vice-chairman hopes he will remain at the governing body in some capacity.
Southgate is weighing up whether to lead the country into Euro 2024 or resign after six years in which he has completely transformed the national team. He is expected to make a decision early next year.
“I think Gareth should stay,” Dein said. “The FA think the same, they want him to stay. He may decide he can’t take the team any further and he may be right. I’d like him to stay in some capacity because I think he’s a decent man.”
Southgate, 52, has had some wonderful times as England manager – leading the nation to a first major tournament semi-final in 28 years, then a first final since 1966 – but indicated he could decide to call it quits after all the criticism he faced in the past 18 months.
After leading England to within a penalty shootout of lifting a first European Championship trophy, he was widely derided for being too defensive and cautious in the final against Italy and blamed for the defeat, many seemingly overlooking that it was a pretty major achievement for England to reach a final at all.
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There was also the night at Wolves when England were thrashed 4-0 by Hungary, at the of an international break when they lost twice to Hungary and drew with Germany and Italy, and the evening turned toxic.
With the prospect of Southgate stepping down, debate has raged since the World Cup quarter-final defeat to France as to whether the England manager’s job should be reserved for an Englishman. Mauricio Pochettino and Thomas Tuchel – two of the most respected managers – are out of work and would be open to managing England. But the leading English managers – Eddie Howe at Newcastle United and Chelsea’s Graham Potter – are at the start of exciting Premier League projects.
“I’ve never been opposed to a foreign coach,” Dein said, who has been in Qatar for the World Cup and believes the country has “won a lot of friends” during the month-long tournament, despite strong criticism, mainly from the West, of the country’s abuses of migrant workers and treatment of LGBT+ people in a country where same-sex relationships are criminalised.
“Qatar have won a lot of friends because of this World Cup and the way it has been handled,” Dein, 79, said. “The stadiums have been sensational: Lusail, Al Thumama… Architecturally, they’re really beautiful. Everybody got to the stadia on time, the games have kicked off on time, the refereeing overall’s been very good, VAR [has] largely been fine, it’s been a very successful tournament.
“If you ask the fans and you ask the players, have they enjoyed it, yes they have. And we have to ask ourselves: what is football without fans? The fans haven’t had to travel. You take the coming World Cup in three countries, and in Brazil we were in Rio one day, Manaus the other, then Sao Paulo, you’re spending five hours travelling. We’ve had an hour maximum. This has been a great World Cup, a unique World Cup, we’ve never seen it before, we’ll never see it again. It’s been a privilege to be here.”
Dein also believes the quality of football has demonstrated the benefits of a winter World Cup. “There is another argument for a winter World Cup,” he said. “I know [club] managers won’t like it because they will lose their players at a critical time, but for the World Cup itself as a tournament, the players are fresher. There is no doubt.”
Dein hopes that Qatar hosting the World Cup will bring long-term improvement to the country’s human rights. i recently spoke to Nasser Al-Khori, a 33-year-old Qatari and executive director of Generation Amazing, an arm of the World Cup organisers, who insisted that hosting the tournament has sped up human rights reforms.
“The last 10 years there’s been a spotlight on Qatar, but that’s part of us reforming. Whether it’s on the labour side, on different human rights, we’re using the World Cup as a vehicle to expedite that reform,” he told i. “But the reform had to take place regardless of the World Cup. We, as a country, had those values of inclusivity and social cohesion.
“Those labour reforms had to happen because of our value system. If anything, the World Cup helped us expedite and change those social reforms across the board, whether it’s workers or LGBT rights.”
Dein said: “They’ve been very open-minded to it. I spent a lot of my life giving people second chances and I think Qatar will benefit from this. I hope so. That should be a legacy for them.”
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