Substance Over Style

If you didn’t know it’s the Euro Final today: England v Spain.

Whether or not you’re *actually* clued up on football, it’s likely all you’ve heard for weeks is how bad the manager, Gareth Southgate, is at his job.

It struck me as odd. England’s in the final after all. What else do you want from a football manager other than to make the team win?

The answer, seemingly, is that the fans want a more impressive display. 

As people around me started to bash the team, I began to question the contrast between style and performance.

If Southgate were to orchestrate a beautiful or exciting performance, would the fans be less aggy than if he were to focus on winning?

Modern society values the appearance of performance more than the outcome.

The worst athlete in any Olympic event is almost certainly in another league to you or me. Yet we’ll adorn the winner, maybe the top three, with sponsorships and praise – not giving a second thought to those in the remainder of the top ten places.

History remembers the victors.

Southgate is performing.

Could he be doing better? Stick your head out the window near any Wetherspoons in the country and you’ll be told, resoundingly, yes.

But, most importantly, is he doing his job? Of course. In fact he’s doing it better, inarguably, than any manager in the past fifty years.

Yet there are legions of Lions fans who want his head on the chopping block for delivering the outcome that John Smiths’ enjoyers have been begging for, for decades.

The history books will remember Southgate as a success irrespective of the result this evening. No matter how ugly or dull the football is, the facts are the facts. 

During the groupstage all I heard was BS. Then England won the quarters and it was much the same. The semis came and the general sentiment was that the success came in spite of Southgate, rather than because of him.

The culture of nitpicking, pessimism and frustration, of looking for lightning rods for rage and castigation rather than things to lean into and support, is straight-up nasty.

We talk of supporting a team and yet, when the results are clear as day, there’s little support to be seen. The vitriol towards Southgate has been powerful enough bluster to power the nation’s on-shore impending wind farms for a whole year.

Regardless, once the final whistle goes, “it’s coming home” rings from living rooms in Marshall Meadows Bay right down to the working man’s club in Lizard Point.

We’re a nation of curmudgeons, that much is obvious. Even in the face of unique history like winning the Euros (which England never has), we’d rather set ourselves up to be right in anticipating failure than risk being wrong in the vein of support.

Whether you couldn’t give a flying header about England winning, or know that your week’s mood is entirely balanced on the end of Southgate’s ballpoint pen, next time you find yourself smugly playing devil’s advocate for the sake of ego, switch the horns for the halo. 

Play angel’s advocate instead. It’ll feel better, believe me.