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Gareth Southgate believes everything is in place for England to win Euro 2024 - but warned success won’t just fall into the players’ laps or simply happen as a culmination of the hard work put in so far.
The Three Lions boss spoke in glowing terms of the effort the squad have put in to reach this stage to face Spain, not just during this summer in Germany but over a number of years, as well as again reinforcing his belief that the togetherness of the group has led to a gradual improvement in performances as the tournament has gone on.
However, his last public words to the group ahead of Sunday’s final in Berlin emphasised that they’d have to once more earn victory in a tough environment, despite the possible storylines and symmetries around Southgate and England winning in Germany, almost three decades after this year’s host nations won on English soil at Euro ‘96 following Southgate’s own missed penalty.
“Look, I’m not a believer in fairytales but I am a believer in dreams, and we’ve had big dreams. We’ve felt the need and the importance of that, but then you have to make those things happen,” he told media at the Olympiastadion ahead of the final.
“And fate, the run that we’ve had, the late goals, the penalties: all that doesn’t equate to it being our moment. We have to make it happen tomorrow. We have to perform at the level that we need to. Of course it would be a lovely story but it’s in our hands and our performance is the most important thing.”
One big factor in Southgate’s favour in terms of preparing as he wants to is that he confirmed all 26 players were fit and available - “not unusual for a cup final,” as he drily noted.
England’s preparation has again been on recovery and planning rather than specific training, with one day fewer than Spain to prepare for the match. That means it has been a consistent information flow throughout, focusing on small details which might make the difference.
“We haven’t had time on the training pitch but several meetings assessing the opponenents and trying to work out the best way to play them but the message hasn’t changed,” he said.
“It’s a long-term vision and we break it down into smaller pieces. We’ve got experience of big matches, you don’t need to say too much to the players. Fine margins decide these games and we’ve got to make sure we’re on the right side of them. We keep repeating mentality and approach to the game, our decision making being important. You’ve got to make sure on these nights you get everything right.”
Harry Kane, alongside Southgate, added to the feeling that by this point everything has been said that needs to, noting he didn’t need to guide the younger members of the squad much even with their inexperience.
“Everything’s done before kick-off. I’ll have a final word in the huddle but everyone’s ready by then,” he said. “Even the younger players, they are fearless and a lot of them just want to get out there and get the ball at their feet. I’m sure they’ll be ready for that tomorrow night.”
On the opponents and the opportunity ahead, Southgate acknowledged England face a tough task against Spain but added it was more about appreciating their talents and making sure his own side showed theirs, rather than being worried about the capabilities of La Roja, seen by many as the best team of the tournament.
“Not so much a concern but my observations on the team are they have a settled team, clear way of playing, press really well with intensity and they keep possession exceptionally well. You have to be organised the way they play but we’ve kept the ball well the last few matches and have been showing our real selves. That’s been starting to come over the last three matches, we played very well against Netherlands and that’s our intention again tomorrow night.”
With the talking done, the manager knows it’s simply about finding the right outcome this time after several near-misses for England already - and the World Cup of two years ago not quite living up to the expectations the team have set since 2018.
“The high expectations are still there but we have had consistent performances over certainly three of the last four tournaments and a quarter-final as well in the fourth,” he said.
“In the end, you always have to be in the latter stages of the tournaments to be able to learn how to win those big games. We’re learning that, we’ve come through a lot of big nights now. A lot of records that we’ve broken.
“But we know in the end, we have to do this one, we have to get this trophy to really feel the respect of the rest of the football world. Now we have a fabulous opportunity tomorrow to achieve what we set out [for], from the moment we left Qatar a bit earlier than we’d have liked to.”
