BobbyD wrote:'Success' is very difficult to quantify in football. You could argue that with a 100% win rate Sam Allardyce is the most successful England manager of all time. Then again you might argue, controversially, that being forced to resign after only 67 days in the job after being caught in a sting by undercover reporters was an unmitigated failure...
The two major debates when it comes to the English national team is which squad were most overhyped by zealous fans and media, and which manager underperformed most badly. Honestly you could throw a blanket over most of the contenders and use the time much more productively doing something else.
Suffice to say Southgate isn't a great manager, if he was frankly he wouldn't be managing England, he'd have a full time job at the top of the prem, or La Liga, or even Serie A but he's a less useless than Allardyce or Hodgson, which is a low bar. But the question you should always ask with a manager is if not him then who? England aren't going to get a top tier manager, unless they want a nice semi-retirement job, so Southgate is probably about par for what England can expect.
Really good reply BobbyD - thanks.
"Success" in the context the article I read was measured in stages of international competitions - QFs, SFs, Finals etc. You'd know better than I what they may or may not be, but there's this QF, the final of the euros, 3rd place (equivalent to SF I guess) in the UEFA Nations League thing, and the last WC SF.
Bobby Robson made a WC SF, Venables a Euro SF and Ramsey a WC winner.
Of course you are right - other definitions of "success" would provide other metrics/KPFs maybe.
WRT the "overhyped by zealous fans and media" that was certainly my perception - until Southgate's start and the 2018 world cup. I would concur up to then it did seem that one was bombarded with "England will win it this time", 1966 all over again [1], "its coming home" became tedious... ISTR baddiel and skinner saying something like they wish they'd never recorded it 9or similar). But possibly because nobody gave the England squad in 2018 any chance whatsoever that ridiculous hype seemed to disappear. All credit then to SG that the managed his squad to a SF place as "no hopers" when the "better" previous squads hadn't even achieved that (fair praise to Robson in 1986).
As for replacement - bang on. Its the situation the RFU sort of found itself in. By all means get rid of the coach - but who of *sough* international class is available NOW to replace them? By definition anybody "any good" is already in a post (no disrespect to Steve Borthwick intended). England
football had tried top flight foreign managers before and done no better/worse than Southgate. So when push comes to shove is it REALLY the manager's international credentials? or his/her ability to gel a bunch of players to be a better sum of parts - which Southgate when it comes to the crunch (international competitions) seems to have achieved more than any other England manager, including Ramsey overall.
I'll shut up now and go back to chatting about rugby union and cricket
didds
[1] as a rugby fan, its getting like that in English RU with some demographics. Banging on about 2003 - its was 20 years ago - time to forget it. Yes there were (losing) finals in 1991, 2007 and 2019 - but you are only as good as your last game or at least tournament - time to move on!