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Gareth Southgate has resigned as England manager following… Defeat against Spain in the Euro 2024 final.
Telegraph Sport looks at the contenders for the national job after Southgate and the Football Association They agreed to separate.
Newcastle manager He is on the shortlist of possible candidates should there be a change. It is understood he has been one of the subjects of informal conversations when a possible successor to Southgate has been discussed. The big question is how involved he is in the St James’ Park project, where he has guided the team to the Champions League following the takeover by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund. He is on a long-term contract on good terms.
He has a great reputation despite lasting less than a season at Chelsea and being out of football for over a year. Having started out at Ostersund in Sweden and Swansea City, it was at Brighton that he emerged as a coach with a clear style of play and the ability to improve young players. It was at the Amex Stadium that Worked with Dan Ashworthwho was previously the Football Association’s director of elite development and oversaw England’s spectacular improvement at youth level.
If there is one manager who knows how to get the best out of Harry Kane, it is Pochettino. The Argentine was Tottenham manager when Kane began his goalscoring streak. But there were other English players who also benefited from his guidance: at the 2018 World Cup, Southgate took five Spurs players to Russia. Pochettino is available after leaving Chelsea And his reputation was intact after a year at Stamford Bridge. But there were doubts about whether being England manager would be welcomed in his home country.
The FA? Appoint a German coach for the national team? If that were the case, Tuchel would be excellent in knockout games with his game management and set-up, as he showed when guiding Chelsea to Champions League glory in 2021. Chelsea’s plight since his dismissal suggests the problems are not limited to the manager. And while Tuchel’s time at Bayern Munich didn’t last long, fans also wanted him back and signed a petition for him to stay.
Moving from England Under-21 manager to senior boss is a path Southgate took when he replaced Sam Allardyce in 2016. Carsley has been highly rated by the FA since his appointment with the Under-20s four years ago and the 50-year-old has been sounded out for roles elsewhere, including with the Republic of Ireland, where he earned 40 caps as a player.
The FA has always had its eye on the “golden generation” of the 2000s as future managers. Gerrard completed an FA coaching education course before becoming manager of Rangers and Aston Villa. He is now at Al-Ettifaq as part of the expansion of the Saudi Pro LeagueGary Lineker has defended Lampard, pointing out that he was unlucky in his previous jobs and would have the respect of the players. Lampard’s last job was in an interim role upon returning to Chelsea in 2023, after his first spell in 2019-21 ended with him being sacked.
Southgate’s successor: Our experts pick the next England manager
Chris Bascombe: Eddie Howe
The Football Association is questioning why anyone would want to leave a city where he has the chance to earn godlike status by regularly qualifying for the Champions League (and has the resources to build a team to his dreams) to take a job where he is vilified for failing to win the Euros or the World Cup. Yet Howe has publicly said the England job is his ultimate goal. If he really can’t say no, it seems a no-brainer to offer it to him.
John Percy: Mauricio Pochettino
England need to look further afield and find someone who can take a very talented team to the next level. Pochettino would demand immediate respect. He has an aura and, more importantly, the experience to ensure that players like Jude Bellingham and Phil Foden are on the way. These players now need to look up to someone who has star quality and I believe Pochettino has that, if the Football Association is willing to look outside England for the next manager. Pochettino can work with young players and, while he is certainly strong-willed, he would be smart enough to work within the FA structure.
As for Southgate, it is possible to have both opinions: that he has been a fantastic signing and has taken England forward, but also to acknowledge that his time is up and that he is, perhaps, holding certain players back with his inherent caution.
Sam Dean: Mauricio Pochettino
A confession: I feel instinctively uncomfortable with the idea of a non-Englishman managing the English national team. A personal view is that an international team should only be able to employ a manager from that nation. But rules are rules and the decision-makers at the FA would be foolish to limit themselves to Englishmen when they can cover a wider spectrum.
Putting aside the question of nationality, Pochettino emerges as the most attractive candidate. He is not obsessed with strict tactical systems (which are almost impossible to impose at international level, given the lack of training time), he is more than capable of creating the right culture and environment that England need, and he has the charisma and personality to handle the extraordinary off-field demands of managing our national team.
Daniel Zeqiri: Thomas Tuchel
The argument that international football should be about the best of us versus the best of you has plenty of merit, but from a footballing perspective, Tuchel ticks a lot of boxes.
He has an excellent record in cup competitions and is one of the best in Europe when it comes to preparing a team for a one-off tie. Tuchel has worked in the Premier League and managed Harry Kane at Bayern Munich, so his knowledge of the player landscape is not in doubt.
He is known to be a prickly character at times, but he is an excellent coach. Dealing with players in the shorter moments of international breaks could be a good option. There is no chance of fighting with a national association for control of transfers because there is none.
His positional and structured football would be a step closer to what players at Manchester City, Arsenal and now Chelsea are used to doing at club level. International football is a different matter, but it seems England need to take advantage of the methodology shared by the country’s top clubs.
Thom Gibbs: Graham Potter
I have convinced Graham Potter, the candidate for continuity, as a decent, sensible man with an unfinished career as a club manager. The most important question for any interviewee will be “what would I have done differently at this Euros?” and I suspect Potter would answer “not much”, which will probably please the FA. For all the frustrations about Southgate’s tactics, selection and substitutes, he transformed the culture of the national team. That should not be wasted and Potter seems more likely to preserve his legacy than some of the more high-profile names, who never work out for England anyway.
