In England there is a mood of doom before the classic against Germany. Despite the misery, Gareth Southgate sees himself as the right coach for the World Cup.
Hissed at by the fans, torn up in the local media – but Gareth Southgate continues to ooze self-confidence: “I think I’m the right person to lead the team into the tournament,” said the England coach, “without a doubt”. But the skepticism is enormous, the motherland of football is in panic mode almost eight weeks before the start of the World Cup.
The home game against Germany, which is actually meaningless from a purely sporting point of view, will be a character test on Monday (8:45 p.m. / RTL). “Sometimes in football there are those moments where you have to go deep inside, as a player, as a whole team, as a coach, to see where we can improve. This is definitely such a moment for us,” said the captain Harry Kane.
With the 0-1 in Italy, relegation from the first division of the Nations League was sealed on Friday, only one point from five games is the worst run in 30 years. “A dark phase” headlined the Guardian, the Sun wrote of a “bleak evening”. In a poll by the tabloid, 83 percent of fans voted for Southgate’s dismissal before the desert World Cup.
On Friday, the supporters who had traveled with them booed and whistled at their team boss. The media are already speculating about successor candidates like Mauricio Pochettino or Newcastle’s Eddie Howe.
But Southgate is deliberately relaxed, radiating calm before the classic in the sold-out Wembley Stadium at the end of the Nations League. “There are a lot of positive signals from us as a team,” he said. “We’ll put things right.”
Unlike in public, Kane also sees “no panic” in the team, according to the star striker: “As a group, we know what we are about and we will fight our way through this difficult phase.” The Three Lions have not scored a single goal from open play in the Nations League, only Kane scoring from the point in the first leg in Germany.
“It’s difficult to give an exact explanation as to why we’re not scoring. We’re getting into the right zones, but if we had to deliver, that last bit of quality is missing,” said Southgate.
The problems of the English are similar to those of the Germans, who have also recently shown themselves to be far too harmless. The duel with the DFB-Elf is the dress rehearsal for the World Cup opening game against Iran on November 21st for the European Vice-Champions.
“In the past we’ve had a bunch of friendlies or whatever and then we’ve gone into tournaments and that was the first time we’ve faced quality opponents and that’s hit us in the face quite a lot,” said Southgate. Now the European Championship runner-up has played against some top teams and will “be better” at the World Cup.
However, the broad masses in football’s home country do not yet really believe in it.