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The football publication is oddly uninspiring, yet strangely captivating. Its title raises questions. The Dear England title currently belongs to a popular play, an upcoming television program, and a public letter authored by the manager in 2021.

This edition of Dear England isn’t officially connected to those. It represents an oddity in the Dear England Multiverse, a volume about guidance: a traditionally uninspiring elite football manager theme that the author follows doggedly, using the words “leader”, “guiding” or “leadership” at least 500 times across 336 pages.

Inquiries Posed

“What defines a leader? What actions do leaders take? What knowledge do leaders possess?” the author questions in the opening, setting out his position, but stopping short to ask “Why are leaders?”, themes probably saved for a second book.

Beyond that, this publication contains a notable absence in the middle. It’s an attempt in subtly confrontational personal vindication, in coming close without actually stating the actual thing, jumping skillfully from lingering grievance to unscabbed wound across a series of pie charts, business clichés and digressions about historical figures.

Engagement

Going through the book is like listening to your family members having a mannered but deeply felt argument in the adjacent space while you’re trying to concentrate on a professional workshop titled “Numerous Justifications for My Ultimate Victory”. But it is also impossible to disengage, as the author keeps drifting near to something you truly want to discover, before unexpectedly veering away.

Revelations

There are typically attention-grabbing disclosures in works in this genre, explained by the rapt fascination with the role of England manager. The most striking instances are: the manager decided he was absolutely going to resign as England manager after spectators threw beer glasses at him at the Euros; he nearly decided to forfeiting the game at half-time against the Bulgarian team in 2019 after his players were targeted with slurs; he introduced the concept of set-piece coaches and all teams in the top division is now adopting his methods; he has now lost his enthusiasm for the sport, a startling revelation briefly included in a short passage at the final part.

Leading England through a period of rage, aspiration, turmoil and pandemic restrictions was a brutal journey. The wounds are evidently still unhealed.

Generic Content

Otherwise, the content is overrun with an computer-generated verbal clutter of standard management talk. Review editions of this publication were distributed with critics under confidentiality clauses ahead of launch, likely out of fear someone might disclose that “tough talks can, by their inherent quality, be challenging”, that you should always consider the consequences, that guidance occurs where evolution combines with understanding.

Sincere Expression

Readers will find however authentic sentiment within. Leading England through a period of rage, optimism, upheaval and lockdown was a brutal ordeal. The bruises are obviously still raw, albeit expressed in a terminology-heavy reinvention of the standard coach narrative: why I was actually right about all matters throughout.

Specific Examples

The publication’s introductory section, Trojan-horsed as gripping accounts of the championship match of the European Championship, is all about how good he actually was at tactical substitutions (the major common complaint revolving around he wasn’t effective at making changes). Further on, he explores significant detail about how he oversaw the deciding game of 2021 perfectly – particularly the losing spot-kick decider – because he complied with a established procedure, which must mean that introducing young players very late to take the biggest attempt of their existence was logical and right.

That approach was validated by a victorious shootout against Switzerland at a later tournament after a match where England spent the entire match looking as if they were trying to wear a pullover the wrong way round. “The control we exerted in that tiebreaker was absolutely exhilarating,” he writes, amid equating the display to US Navy Seals eliminating a notorious figure. Goodness.

Avoided Revelations

When we come near to a revelation, the manager backs away from identifying individuals or sharing the juice. We discover there were problematic England squad members who demanded more focus, maybe because they were indulged early in their professional journeys. But as you anticipate expectantly, he is quickly veering off into something titled a specific management theory, which claims that instead of a grouping of characteristics or principles, organizational ethos is in fact a phenomenon that is developed by, unfortunately, enough, we’ve heard enough.

Strengths

Among the better bits are when he writes about the gradual process of building mental toughness in youth, or how he sought to define Englishness more lucidly and more constructively than any public personality in the spotlight. Most impressively, there is a truly absorbing narrative of that harrowing evening in Sofia where England’s players of color were subjected to vile treatment (and afterwards defended vigorously by their leader).

Genuine Ending

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