Former England boss Gareth Southgate has revealed he will not be “rushing” into a new coaching role, after taking advice from people who have held high office.
Southgate resigned two days after Spain beat the Three Lions at the Euro 2024 final in July, after eight years in the coveted role.
In his first major interview since then, he said: “The fact it is one of the biggest jobs, I think, has meant I’ve wanted to give myself more time to talk to lots of fascinating people who have been in big jobs and find out what they did after that.
“I don’t want to betray their confidences but people have been very generous with sharing and talking about those things, and all of them have said, ‘Don’t rush’.
“I’ve been 37 years a player and coach, and I’m not against the next period of my life being totally different. When you’ve had one of the biggest jobs, how do you follow that up?
“Of course, with the national team it has a higher purpose as well but there will be other challenges out there that will excite me – and that doesn’t have to be in coaching.”
Talking to Lauren Laverne on Desert Island Discs, Gareth, 54, alluded to how difficult it was to leave his dream job by choosing the Adele song Someone Like You.
He said: “I kept playing it towards the end of the last Euros, because I knew I was going to be leaving.
“I’d made my mind up that it was time for change on all sides and there are so many of the words within it that even if I hear it today that it relates to my relationship with England and their relationship with me, and how I feel about it all really.
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“Like how they’ve got to move on and you wish them the best and there are regrets, and there were actually memories to be made. There are so many lines in it that actually really resonated with me.”
Noting that he hopes to “avoid” talking in detail about the England team, he said: “I would never want to be in the way.”
He also discussed the pain of his missed penalty in the Euro semi-final against Germany in 1996, saying: “When we lost the Euros in 2021, I don’t for one minute think about the reason being the players that missed the penalties.
“We had 120 minutes to win the game. I’ve told them that’s not how I view that night – but it is still how I view ’96. I struggled to move on from it. There was no aftercare or support, because nobody thought about it in those days.”
Gareth also named The Carpenters’ Rainy Days and Mondays, and Shape of You by Ed Sheeran among his top tracks.
The father of two chose The Chimp Paradox by Steve Peters as his book and a coffee machine as his luxury item to take to the island.
The full interview is on BBC Radio 4, 10am today, or BBC Sounds
