Luiz Felipe Scolari gravely embarrassed the FA yesterday by revealing that he was willing to accept the England job two years ago, but that it was the impatience of Brian Barwick, the FA chief executive, that caused the deal to fall apart. Instead of World Cup-winning Scolari, the FA turned to Steve McClaren, who subsequently failed to guide the team to the Euro 2008 finals.

At the time, Scolari and the FA suggested that the intrusion of the English press had put the Brazilian off the job. As he finally arrived to work in England — for Chelsea rather than the governing body — Scolari did not dispute that the media were a factor. “It was one of the reasons, because they tried to enter my building and looked through my rubbish,” he said. “I was afraid of the impact on my family, but I am prepared for that now.”

But a bigger sticking point was Barwick’s refusal to wait until Scolari’s Portugal or England had been knocked out of the 2006 World Cup finals to announce the deal. Scolari did not want accusations of disloyalty if the countries met — as they did in the quarter-finals — but he confirmed yesterday that he had been willing to sign a pre-contract committing himself to England. Barwick had insisted on going public straight away.

The chief executive had backed himself into a corner, something he came to regret, by publicly declaring at the start of the managerial search that he would definitely make an announcement before the 2006 tournament. He compounded that error by being caught boarding a flight to Lisbon to conduct his negotiations with Scolari.

“If they [the FA] had agreed [announce it] after the competition, I would have signed a pre-contract before the competition,” he said. “They did not agree because they needed to tell the press who was the coach.”

Asked if he regretted the outcome, Scolari said: “No. I followed my life and the England team followed their life. Now it is Fabio Capello [who manages England], my best friend in football.” But we can all speculate how history might have turned out differently if Barwick had bided his time.