Talking a good game: how Gareth Southgate has risen above the blather

The England manager has generally avoided clangers and corporate-speak and his sole lapse ‘owning the process’ may have been a radical rhetorical device that worked

Every England manager has had verbal idiosyncrasies and Gareth Southgate is no different. Which is to say: he is different.

The most successful performer of the Impossible Job, Sir Alf Ramsey, developed a posh accent seemingly intended to mask his modest roots. But that didn’t mean he was snooty. “I suppose I’ll have to get used to being addressed as Sir,” he said in 1967 after being knighted for ongoing services to commemorative tat vendors. “But if any player gets formal with me I’ll clobber him.”

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