We welcome back Gareth Southgate to High Performance for his most open and reflective conversation yet.
In this episode, Gareth breaks his silence on England’s “almost” era, revealing the fear of failure, pressure of history, and fine margins that have shaped his time as manager. He discusses the burden of expectation, the culture of small daily habits and respect he’s built, and the empathy and vulnerability that define his modern approach to leadership.
From handling Wayne Rooney’s retirement to protecting players from public scrutiny, Southgate opens up about the realities of leading under relentless pressure, the evolution of England’s team culture, and what legacy truly means beyond trophies.
This is a rare, honest conversation with one of football’s most thoughtful leaders, about resilience, accountability, and what it really takes to lead a nation.
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#highperformance #Football #PremierLeague #England #WorldCup #Euros #GarethSouthgate #EnglandFootball #ThreeLions #HarryKane #Bellingham #Rashford #Saka#PremierLeague #Soccer #FIFA #uefa
📕Chapters
00:00 – Intro
00:33 – Leaving England
02:31 – Euro 2024
15:13 – English Football Media
20:20 – The Day After The Final
23:07 – 2016’s Toxic England
28:15 – Changing The Culture
38:13 – 2018 World Cup
44:23 – England’s Negative Mindset
49:29 – Euro 96
53:03 – England’s Penalty Curse
1:00:20 – Euro 2020 Final
1:06:18 – Rooney’s Retirement
1:12:40 – Southgate’s Legacy
43 Comments
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southgate is the only reason why england is not euro-champion.
Better than Tuchel I reckon!
I have a lot of respect for the work and achievements of Southgate. In that final he needed to be brave with his team selection and substitutions. We planned to not lose, but wasnt Brave enough to go and win a final. It was time for him to leave.. and he gave it his all and did it with respect and dignity. But to be a winner, you need to be brutal and Brave when the times comes to go and win a final..
One could argue that Southgate was brought in to turn around a negative England team/player CULTURE.. He did that and almost got to a winning trophy. Maybe Tucal can take it to another lvl. HOWEVER, rather than talking about Culture, maybe we can talk about a WINNING CULTURE is…
Forgot to ask him why he betrayed Raheem Sterling after 2022
I firmly believe if England do not WIN a World Cup or European Championship in 12 years he will be back in the hot Seat within 20 years. He will have a chance to go for the win, i would have liked to ask him if he would have done anything different in that final ?
ask him about low performance of never starting cole palmer even though he got the most assists and 2nd most goals in the premier league.
He was a couple minutes and a Bellingham overhead kick away from getting knocked out by Slovakia in the RO16 after an awful performance
Woke clown 🤡
I'll never understand why he substitued Rice in that final vs Italy so early in the 2nd half when he was England's best player on that day. Such a huge mistake
U cost us winning against Spain by sitting back and never played palmer which was stupid u favoured players too much why should we feel bad for u. U played foden who was doing bad. Every England manager does it
This guy is the most successful manager for England in half a century. The way he wae treated was a disgrace
He's achievements with the national team are phenomenal, quarter finals, semi finals and 2 finals
The culture, atmosphere and feeling he was instrumental in creating.
Unfortunately he just fell short on the pitch, tactics, substitutions and team selection.
If only he had better coaching staff or a real football man tactician alongside him
Went to all the tournaments that Southgate went us to and I thought he did a fantastic job!
I wish he could of had an extra slice of luck, it couldn’t of happened to more nice fella, but it wasn’t to be.
Gareth did an amazing job but fell short in a weird time when we actually should have won something and there were very few excuses at all. The Croatia semi was a serious tactical disaster, no one would have moaned about losing to that french team in the final they were better but should have beaten Croatia in 18.
In the wembley euro final there really were no excuses we had everything to our advantage and somehow lost. That's the one which will never go away unfortunately. We were definitely on par with France in Qatar and it really could have gone either way, Kane missed his pen and that was that. And tbh in the euro 24 final we didn't deserve to win but still had opportunities to do better especially on their second goal when we had sort of come back into the game and had them rattled. Also had one cleared off the line in stoppage time if I remember right. It's one of them, ultimately if you get over the line nothing else matters.
The fact that Southgate even said himself that the FA offering him a contract before the Euros was a bad idea sums the FA up, how can't they learn from past mistakes like Southgate could see being rewritten?
Any top manager or player has said they can't enjoy moments for long… they are onto the next achievement and milestone, it's not a sign of burnout, it's a sign of having a top mentality, shows that Southgate isn't a winner
Brilliant interview. I'm not denying Southgate had some games which he could've handled a bit better, but listening to how he manages and approaches people and tricky situations, I am again reminded that this is someone who unquestionably transformed the mentality of the England squad for the better.
Many will hate that I'm going to say this but if we win the WC or Euros in the coming years it'll be at least partially because of the influence of Southgate's time in charge.
Think he was good but felt he should’ve gone after euro 2020, he capped us at only being a runners up.
I mean thinking of maybe Arsenal, they had a team who were used to being runners up, and this season bringing in more winners, changes the attitudes.
I don’t personally like him, but I don’t personally think he ruined our chances.
His style of play is one that is to scrape through, not win outright.
Tuchel will be the one to win hopefully
Also lads, once again, doing shameless double personalised ads whilst having ads on YouTube already, gone 2 minutes without even seeing the podcast. Sort it out
The Man we needed at the time. Great memories.
Being a Boro fan, I will always have love and admiration for Sir Gareth Southgate ❤️
However, very early on, he said something I disagree with.
The stuff at the start about changing the manager is about hope, and actually, they still have the same problems, etc…
A top head coach or manager can change the direction of travel by making just a few tweaks or changing some mindset. Football is often about fine margins, and a good coach can be that margin.
I still love you 😂 and it would be amazing to see you back at Boro in some capacity!
England fans are just entitled, and never know what they want, and when they do know what they want they have no clue how to even get it. We want to play like Spain despite having no culture of playing that football, they wanted to compete now competing isn’t enough they need to compete and play the fans favourites, everyone seems to know better.
Cant wait to watch this got a lot of time for Gareth. Imo doesn't get anywhere near enough credit for basically taking a team for had been dumped out by Iceland then the FA appointing a manager that lasted one game. Took the same team from as low as I can remember in recent years (maybe since 2008?, to 3 semi-finals and two finals. Part of the disappointment of 2018 was wondering if I would ever see my country in a major semi-final again and got watch not just 2 more but never lost a semi in a major tournament after that. He will only be better'd in my eyes by someone that wins something.
Loved ol Garth, great guy, hope to see him in a prem job soon, thanks for all you did Gareth 🦁🦁🦁.
Uppah Towen 💙🤍🚜
He was too concerned with being a social justice warrior to lead England to victory.
This man should be in jail with the rest of them after he pushed the poisoned clot-shot onto our children.
Amazing man, with a sense of humility and intelligence that should be valued. Thank you Sir Gareth
This bloke absolutley infuriates me. To his credit he galvanized the England set up and took us to another level, but its quite clear that he didnt have the tactical understanding to take us all the way.
Done a great job for making England important again and was very unlucky to not win something really. I was happy for the first time again watching England since Euro 96 really
I have nothing but love and respect and admiration for Gareth Southgate. Our society needs more people like him like him in public positions of authority. Decent. Honest. Unselfish. What a guy. 🫡
He did an exceptional job, no bones about it. The problem was the fans needs to feel like they’re listened to, and Gareth rightly or wrongly, was very stubborn in his ways.
What an incredible half dozen tournaments with him though.
England fans have to be the most entitled arrogant lot on planet earth. The English media are also trash
In the end he never won a tournament n unfortunately greatness is not bout falling short
Whether you like or loath him ,Gareth certainly improved the team ,and was England's most successful Manager ,since Alf Ramsay .
Neither can you just pin the blame on the Manager for not winning trophies .
The players also share the responsibility.
Southgate was necessary. Nothing more.
that sounded like political talk to me at the end … I disagreed with some of the in game tactics / mentality approach / political side show during Gareth's tenure, but there's no doubt he transformed / innovated the England team setup in many positive ways, plus fundamentally, he's a decent man. When he talked about resigning as Manager, it made me sympathise – must be incredibly hard to walk away from the top job in English football (despite the toxicity) that he held for nearly a decade, with a contract extension offer on the table — given he put so much in to it and came very close to winning a trophy and knows it probably won't get any better than that in terms of his footballing career.
Rooney, Scholes, Gerrard, Lampard have said recently they didn't enjoy playing for England
I think that's Gareth's biggest legacy players now enjoy playing for their country ❤
At the end of the day only 1 England manager has been better than Southgate if they go on to win the next World Cup no matter what anyone says he will have be a part of helping them get there
Under his watch he gave England fans more great nights and tournament success than anyone else. And it did it all with a quiet dignity. He wasnt perfect but no manager is. Anyone criticising him can't remenber 94, 2008 and 2016. The days when England were dismal.
This conversation with Gareth Southgate was more than a reflection — it was a masterclass in leadership cultivated through pressure and integrity. He didn’t just unpack what went wrong; he exposed what it takes to stand for values, even when the whole world doubts you. Powerful and necessary truth for any leader.