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This football publication is curiously uninspiring, yet strangely irresistible. Even title causes confusion. The Dear England title currently names a popular play, an upcoming TV show, and a national address written by the manager in 2021.

This version of Dear England is not formally connected to those. It stands as an anomaly in the Dear England Multiverse, a volume about guidance: a classically dull top-level coach subject that the author follows doggedly, employing the words “leader”, “leading” or “management” at least 500 times across the book’s entirety.

Themes Explored

“What are leaders? What actions do leaders take? What insights do leaders have?” he asks in the opening, establishing his argument, but stopping short to ask “How are leaders?”, themes probably reserved for a second book.

Additionally, this book has a significant gap at its core. It’s a venture in indirectly hostile self-defense, in coming close without actually expressing the actual thing, jumping nimbly from unresolved issue to unscabbed wound across a assortment of pie charts, business clichés and digressions about Thomas Cromwell.

Engagement

Going through the book is like listening to your family members having a mannered but intensely emotional argument in the adjacent space while you’re trying to concentrate on a business seminar named “Numerous Justifications for My Ultimate Victory”. But it is also challenging to put down, as the author keeps coming close to something you genuinely desire to learn about, before abruptly veering away.

Revelations

There are typically news headlines in works of this nature, such is the rapt interest with England managerdom. The most notable examples encompass: he resolved he was absolutely going to quit as England manager after supporters threw containers at him at the European Championship; he almost chose to withdrawing from the game at half-time against the Bulgarian team in 2019 after his team were subjected to racism; he pioneered the approach of set-piece coaches and the entire league in the Premier League is now adopting his methods; he has now misplaced his love for soccer, a shocking confession briefly included in a single paragraph at the conclusion.

Managing England through a period of rage, optimism, political ferment and confinement was a grueling experience. The scars are evidently still raw.

Predictable Elements

Throughout much of the book, the narrative is overrun with an AI-style verbal clutter of standard guidance discourse. Copies of this book were shared with journalists under secrecy pacts before release, probably out of concern someone might leak that “difficult conversations can, by their inherent quality, be difficult”, that you should always consider the consequences, that management happens where transformation combines with empathy.

Sincere Expression

There is nevertheless real feeling here. Managing England through a period of rage, hope, turmoil and confinement was a harsh ordeal. The wounds are clearly still raw, though presented in a buzzword-filled reinterpretation of the standard leader story: why I was actually right about each issue all along.

Specific Examples

Even publication’s opening passage, presented as thrilling accounts of the championship match of the tournament, is entirely focused on how successful he in fact was at player changes (the major criticism of Southgate being he wasn’t successful at substitutes). Further on, he goes into extensive analysis about how he oversaw the Euros final of 2021 flawlessly – notably the losing spot-kick decider – because he complied with a set protocol, which must mean that bringing on inexperienced squad members very late to take the biggest attempt of their existence was sensible and correct.

This was validated by a successful tiebreaker against Switzerland in a subsequent competition after a match where England spent the full duration looking as if they were trying to wear a pullover the inside out. “Our commanding performance in that shootout was truly exciting,” he writes, while likening the showing to US Navy Seals neutralizing a high-profile target. Dear me.

Missed Opportunities

On the occasions we come near to a revelation, he backs away from identifying individuals or sharing the substance. We hear there were problematic England individuals who insisted on more attention, perhaps because they were pampered at the start of their time in football. But as you anticipate hopefully, the author is already diverting into an area called a leadership concept, which asserts that instead of a collection of qualities or values, organizational ethos is in fact something that is created by, unfortunately, enough, no more.

Notable Sections

Within the more compelling sections are when Southgate writes about the gradual method of building fortitude in youth, or how he attempted to describe Englishness more coherently and more positively than any public personality in the limelight. The standout section, there is a genuinely absorbing narrative of that harrowing match in the Bulgarian capital where England’s players of color were viciously abused (and subsequently supported vigorously by their leader).

Genuine Ending

Possibly the most sincere section {comes|arrives|appears