THAT was the case when the mad imperialist was at the height of his powers and it is the case, too, today — provided, of course, that you take your sample from 100 carefully selected Englishmen. We English have a belief, deeply buried, atavistic and seldom admitted to, that being English is something that is not only unique to English people, but also deeply enviable.
We roll our eyes to the skies when Americans trumpet the same belief about themselves — how crass! — and use it as the basis of foreign policy and environmental philosophy. We smile in derision when French people insist on their own uniqueness, we perform parodic mimes should ever a German do the same.
And yet all this profound sense of the utter rightness of being English is undercut by a deep insecurity about England and Englishness. Maybe they really do do everything better abroad. Maybe the English are actually useless. In Brazil they play football better, the French cook better, the German trains run on time. The Swiss are better at money, the Italians at sex, the Spanish at celebration. Are we actually good at anything, compared with foreigners?
At these moments of self-doubt, all our jingoistic confidence vanishes and we think that a foreigner — any foreigner — must be the answer to everything that is wrong with the problem of being English.
We English are a strange people, split forever between the antique self-certainty of the imperial age and the crippling self-doubt of a small nation off the coast of Europe. We have too much history; we have too much modernity. Our expectations are at the same time crazily optimistic and insanely gloomy. Take the football World Cup: England are expected to (a) win the damn thing and (b) suffer total humiliation.
England is prepared for both results and will greet either with equal relish: endless chest-beating, crowing and celebration, or endless recrimination, blame-hunting and fury.
And so, as the affairs of the national team once again hold the nation in thrall, we find ourselves, as usual, caught between two beliefs. We believe (1) that next time the head coach must be English, whatever else he is, for we have had enough of greedy foreigners with funny accents and ever-open wallets and flies, and (2) we need a head coach who must, whatever else he is, be anything other than English, because that is the only way forward.
We want an English coach who is passionate, down to earth, tough, capable, a rough diamond with an instinct for the right player in the right position. A no-nonsense, salt-of-the-earth footballing man, someone who can give a bollocking, fill his players with fire and go out and show Johnny Foreigner what it means to be English.
We also want a foreign coach who is measured, enigmatic, purposeful, sophisticated, who sees football in ways that are beyond our understanding, who brings the best from his players by the use of his laser-sharp brain and who will allow England to win matches with a glorious inevitability.
I should point out here that practically all football tournaments are won by foreign teams. England have won the World Cup only once, foreigners have won it 16 times. I rest my case.
The English have a great deal of excess emotional baggage when it comes to their football team. Perhaps we should check it in and try to see the problem unencumbered. We have established that it is essential for the next coach to be either (a) English or (b) foreign. Let us now look a little farther.
The argument that only an Englishman truly understands English football will take you only so far; and that is Sam Allardyce. The entire argument about the necessity for an English coach ought to end there. Allardyce is a first-class man: first class at the task of making an effective team from limited resources, loud, bullying, abrasive, smart, capable. The point to consider here is that England do not have limited resources. Do we want a real-ale buff to manage the champagne cellar?
On the other hand, the argument that only a foreigner is suitable to coach England only gets you so far: and that is Guus Hiddink. The entire argument about the need for a foreign coach ought to rest there. Hiddink is a first-class man: first class at making an effective team from limited resources, etc, etc.
I trust I make myself unclear. The new man will have the task of taking England through two qualification tournaments and then, in theory, to the finals of two big tournaments. The basic requirement for the task is not Englishness, nor is it lack of Englishness. It is talent.
England need someone who is as good as Sven-Göran Eriksson in qualifying and someone who is better than Eriksson in the closing stages of a great competition. Martin O’Neill is emerging as the perfect compromise candidate. This is because he is neither English nor foreign. Or perhaps he is both. Either way, there is a sense of destiny shifting his way. This involves a typically English blind spot: we think the Celts are really English at heart. They are not.
On the whole, the Swedes are disposed to be friendly towards the English. Celts have a long tradition of active hostility. So let’s have an England manager who hates the English — that would satisfy the English taste for self-flagellation.
O’Neill’s other qualifications are a trifle thin on the ground — unless you think that winning the Scottish league is football’s Everest — but hey. You try to sign a player who is about to do great things rather than one who has already done them. England need the best coach available, not the best Englishman or the best foreigner. But the England football team are the biggest outlet for national feelings that we possess and as a result it is impossible to separate the question of nationality from the question of nationalism.
We want the new coach to be inspiring, the man himself to lift the spirits and make us feel that England can, once again, conquer the world. The next best thing to global conquest is, after all, the feeling that conquest is within our grasp. With every new appointment we have felt that same surge of excitement: Graham Taylor with his decency and transparency, Terry Venables with his savvy and his swagger, Glenn Hoddle with his playing record and his intellect, Kevin Keegan with his bounce and his enthusiasm, Eriksson with his serenity and his balance.
The cycle continues. And I wonder what we’ll do to the next poor bugger that takes it on. For there is one qualification for the job that I haven’t mentioned yet and without it there is no point in beginning the preliminary interview. The next England head coach may be English, and he may be foreign, but he will most certainly be mad.
