Three months on from Spain winning their fourth European Championship in their history, former England manager Gareth Southgate spoke as a guest at the ECA General Assembly and did not hesitate to acknowledge the superiority of ‘La Roja’ in the tournament.
“Spain were the best team in the tournament. They deserved to win. We didn’t play well enough to win the final. We had a lot of physical problems, players who were not at their best. Our best tournament in terms of performances was probably Qatar, where we reached the quarter-finals. This summer we couldn’t find the same fluidity or the same rhythm, but at the same time we found different ways to win. Still, we reached our first final outside of England,” he said.
The English coach also admitted that his tenure lacked a title: “Expectations are much higher now with the team. I am pleased that we have achieved consistency, which we have shown over four tournaments. But, of course, we’re missing that piece that we haven’t been able to find to bring the trophy to fans who have been waiting a long, long time for it”.
On the pressure felt on the bench of the ‘Three Lions’: “In our country, being a football coach is not comparable to being Prime Minister, but it was one of those jobs where everybody has an opinion and everybody thinks they can do the job. In football, it is sometimes difficult to perform”.
“When the performance is not what they want, players fear that something is going to happen, because these are players who are great players at their clubs, even if they are not first-team players in the national team. Keeping all that in place and being able to keep the noise away, for me personally, was a challenge that years ago I didn’t think I could cope with“.
“You have to be very careful who you listen to, because if you hear so many outside voices that don’t have the information you have it can affect your decision-making,” he said.
