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The football publication is oddly uninspiring, yet curiously captivating. Its title causes confusion. The Dear England title currently is used by a popular play, an forthcoming TV show, and a national address written by the manager in 2021.

This iteration of Dear England isn’t formally related to any of those. It represents an anomaly in the Dear England Multiverse, a book about guidance: a classically uninspiring top-level coach trope that the author follows relentlessly, using the words “leader”, “guiding” or “leadership” at least 500 times across its 336-page length.

Inquiries Posed

“What defines a leader? What actions do leaders take? What knowledge do leaders possess?” the author questions in the opening, establishing his position, but declining to address “Why are leaders?”, questions presumably saved for a second book.

Otherwise, this publication has a book-shaped hole at its core. It’s an exercise in subtly confrontational personal vindication, in almost-but-not-quite stating the actual thing, skipping skillfully from lingering grievance to unscabbed wound across a assortment of pie charts, business clichés and digressions about Thomas Cromwell.

Engagement

Engaging with the text is like overhearing your loved ones having a mannered but intensely emotional disagreement in the nearby area while you’re attempting to concentrate on a corporate presentation named “112 Reasons Why Naturally I Had the Last Laugh”. But it is also difficult to disengage, as Southgate keeps drifting near to an issue you actually desire to hear about, before suddenly changing tack.

Revelations

Readers will find typically attention-grabbing disclosures in publications in this genre, due to the rapt fascination with the role of England manager. The most striking examples are: he resolved he was definitely going to step down as England manager after spectators threw cups at him at the tournament; he nearly decided to abandoning the game at the interval against Bulgaria in 2019 after his players were subjected to racism; he invented the idea of specialist dead-ball trainers and the entire league in the Premier League is now copying him; he has now misplaced his passion for football, a startling admission casually mentioned in a short passage at the conclusion.

Leading England through a time of rage, aspiration, political ferment and confinement was a harsh ordeal. The bruises are obviously still raw.

Commonplace Material

Otherwise, the text is overrun with an robotic linguistic mush of commonplace guidance discourse. Advanced copies of this book were provided with journalists under secrecy pacts ahead of publication, probably out of fear someone might reveal that “challenging discussions can, by their inherent quality, be challenging”, that you should always consider the consequences, that leadership occurs where evolution combines with empathy.

Sincere Expression

There is nonetheless authentic sentiment within. Guiding England through a period of fury, aspiration, political ferment and confinement was a harsh ordeal. The bruises are obviously still fresh, though conveyed in a terminology-heavy reinvention of the traditional coach story: why I was actually right about each issue from the start.

Specific Examples

The publication’s opening passage, disguised as gripping accounts of the final of the European Championship, is completely dedicated to how successful the manager in fact was at tactical substitutions (the major common complaint revolving around he wasn’t effective at substitutes). Later, he goes into significant detail about how he oversaw the championship match of 2021 flawlessly – particularly the failed tiebreaker – because he adhered to a set protocol, which implies that throwing on youthful talents in the closing stages to take the most important attempt of their existence was reasonable and correct.

That approach was validated by a victorious tiebreaker against Switzerland in a subsequent competition after a game where England spent the full duration looking as if they were trying to wear a pullover the wrong way round. “Our dominance in that shootout was truly exciting,” the author notes, amid equating the showing to elite military units killing a notorious figure. Dear me.

Withheld Details

On the occasions we approach to a revelation, the manager backs away from identifying individuals or sharing the substance. We discover there were problematic England squad members who demanded more consideration, perhaps because they were spoilt at the start of their professional journeys. But as you expect hopefully, Southgate is quickly shifting into an area titled The Culture Code, which claims that rather than a grouping of attributes or ideals, culture is in fact an element that is created by, gah, enough, no more.

Notable Sections

Within the more compelling parts are when the author writes about the incremental method of fostering resilience in the next generation, or how he attempted to define Englishness more clearly and more constructively than any public personality in the spotlight. Most impressively, there is a genuinely compelling account of that traumatic night in Sofia where England’s players of color were viciously abused (and afterwards defended forcefully by their leader).

Sincere Finale

Perhaps the most heartfelt segment {comes|arrives|appears