It’s not unfair to suggest that the England national team are in a much better place now than when Gareth Southgate took over, even if the Three Lions failed at the final hurdle again in an international tournament.
There’s a real togetherness about the group which can be seen in the fighting spirit when they’ve gone behind, and after games too. Southgate exudes a genuine warmth which has been reciprocated.
Now that he’s gone, attention will turn to who will be handed the task of bringing success to the England team, ideally as soon as World Cup 2026.
It’s a tall order, but Stan Collymore believes he knows the route that the FA will go down.
Lee Carsley will be the FA’s man for the England job says Collymore
“Emma Hayes and Sarina Wiegman should definitely be in the conversation to be the new England men’s first-team manager because they’re successful football managers in their own right, they know the FA system and the inner workings of it,” he said to CaughtOffside for his exclusive column.
“The reasons that they won’t be are because I think there will be a feeling inside the Football Association that ‘we’ve got the best group of players ever, and we don’t need experiments.’
“How will a group of men react to a woman manager? Would they subconsciously think ‘no she can’t do the job, she’s only managed Chelsea Women’ for example, and that’s the reality.
“Only one step above that would be Lee Carsley and I’ve got a sneaky feeling it’s going to be him. Why?
“The FA’s St George’s Park system was designed to produce players and coaches for the elite level, and with Lee Carsley, they’ve done that from scratch. They’ve invested a lot of money in him to get to this point, and his England U21 team is, pound for pound, the best England team that I’ve ever seen.”
There’s also a cogent argument Collymore details elsewhere in his column which suggests that Carsley would be an underwhelming appointment because he isn’t the big name that supporters want.
Of course, there’s no guarantee of success even if the FA were to land a Pep Guardiola, for instance. After all, Fabio Capello came incredibly highly rated, and look how that turned out.
From an England perspective, whoever is eventually given the keys to the door has to hit the ground running and continue the good work that Southgate has started.
If they don’t, the Three Lions could be stuck back in the international wilderness for years.