After 102 games in charge and two European Championship finals it is easy to forget that Gareth Southgate once turned down the England job.
In July 2016 Southgate was asked by then Football Association chief Martin Glenn if he would be willing to step up from his then role as under-21 manager following the departure of Roy Hodgson and politely declined, making clear that he did not want the job on either a temporary or permanent basis, on the grounds that he did not feel ready for it at that stage of his career.
The FA went on to run a formal recruitment process to appoint the England manager, which did not pan as planned out. Arsene Wenger and Jurgen Klinsmann were among the dream candidates sounded out before Sam Allardyce came out on top of a more prosaic shortlist that also included Alan Pardew and Brendan Rodgers, but took charge of just one match after a newspaper sting.
Allardyce’s defenestration after just 67 days led the FA to return to Southgate as an emergency measure as England had a World Cup qualifier against Malta less than a fortnight later, and the rest is history. Even after four matches as caretaker manager, in which he was undefeated but only enjoyed two victories, Southgate was still expressing doubts about whether he wanted the job.
With just one unsuccessful tournament with the under-21s and a relegation with Middlesbrough under his belt Southgate still saw himself as very much a rookie manager, and was only persuaded to become England boss following a thorough charm offensive by Glenn and Dan Ashworth, then the FA’s director of elite development.
The FA now find themselves in a similar position with Lee Carsley, who is also unsure whether he wants the England job full-time after four games as a caretaker, although there is no gurantee they will get the same outcome.
In some respects Carsley is more qualified for the role than Southgate was at the same stage as he has already shown his tournament credentials by winning last year’s under-21 Euros, while he has also been allowed to appoint his own coaching staff, with his long-term assistant Ashley Cole being given a permanent contract by the FA last month.
Carsley made his misgivings about the job known to his associates long before his bold team selection against Greece backfired spectacularly last week, so it is inconceivable that that the FA were not aware of them. The FA’s sporting director John McDermott has been an almost constant presence by his side since Carsley was made interim manager in August, attending most of his press conferences and even donning a tracksuit to work with him in setting up exercises on the training pitch.
The great unknown is whether McDermott and FA chief executive Mark Bullingham are working hard on Carsley to persuade him to take the job, or if they have someone else lined up. The pair do not appear to have been overly active, as even out-of-work managers such as Graham Potter and Thomas Tuchel have not been approached, never mind those in jobs whose appointment would be more problematic, like Newcastle’s Eddie Howe.
McDermott and Bullingham have not done anything in their careers as significant in football terms as appointing the England manager, while the former is in his first job as a sporting director, albeit having enjoyed success in a different role at Tottenham as academy director. Given this inexperience the size and scale of the decision in front of them cannot be overstated.
It is clear that the FA would like to appoint Carsley, not least as it would save the governing body huge amounts of money, time and potential aggravation from clubs, but he also ticks a huge number of boxes for them.
As a former England under-20 and current under-21 manager he is product of the FA’s coaching pathway at St George’s Park, an inspiration to other homegrown coaches, and even if reluctantly has already shown he can be an impressive spokesperson for the game.
Carsley’s own intentions are far harder to deduce, as he gives little away, and many of his public statements, including after Sunday’s win over Finland, have been riddled with contradictions. Even those who know him well and have worked with him are uncertain what he will do next.
While Carsley has described himself as a development coach and not “world-class” over the last few days, the 50-year-old has undoubtedly had managerial aspirations in the past. At the start of this year the Football Association of Ireland were convinced he was going to become their new manager, with Carsley actively involved in a process that went as far as discussing his salary expectations.
Carsley ended up staying with England under-21’s however, a shrewd decision which has handed him an even bigger dilemma, so despite appearing to know his own mind major U-turns are not unknown to him. As Southgate would confirm, there is a big difference between expressing doubts over taking the England job, and walking away when you are presented with a contract.
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