Martin Thomasson“England is not a trick question – I promise you.”
So says Gareth Southgate in the National Theatre’s brilliantly entertaining production of James Graham’s take on Southgate’s time managing the England men’s football team. Southgate (played with warmth, intensity and sincerity by Gwilym Lee) spreads the Cross of St George flag on the dressing room floor before asking his players to share what that flag (and the country it signifies) means to each of them. By this point in the play, the efforts of Dr Pippa Grange (Liz White) have enabled this group of successful but often stressed young men to share deeply felt truths with each other.
Most notably on this occasion, young Bukayo Saka (Tane Siah) steps forward to deliver a powerful account of his emotions after missing a crucial penalty in the 2021 final of the Euros, and the vicious social media abuse he suffered as a consequence (much of it explicitly racist). Marcus Rashford (Jude Carmichael), the “boy from Wythenshawe,” seizes his moment – along with Raheem Sterling (Gamba Cole) and Jadon Sancho (Kadell Herida) – to articulate the inner conflict imposed upon athletes of colour, who wear the Three Lions with pride, yet are singled out for disproportionate and disgusting attacks whenever the team falls short of the summit.
Southgate’s sympathy, heartfelt though it is, is not enough. “What are you going to do about it?” is the challenge thrown at him. He rises to the challenge, taking a public stand, helping his players speak out (ironically but powerfully, ‘taking a stand’ includes determinedly and pointedly, ‘taking the knee’).
This is Southgate’s story, and we are reminded throughout of the decency of the man.
Penalties are, appropriately enough, the motif of “Dear England.” The performance opens with Southgate watching his younger self miss the penalty in the 1996 semifinal of the Euros (against Germany, of course) which saw England eliminated from a competition they might otherwise have won.
When he became manager, England had never won a penalty shootout. One of his back room staff reveals a key statistic: while England players take an average of 2.8 seconds between placing the ball on the penalty spot and shooting, Germany (the world’s most successful team in penalty shootouts at that point) take an average of 8.4 seconds.
The argument of the play lies in how best to respond to the data. For the back room staff, it’s a simple matter of more practise and a bit less haste. The manager, however, has recruited renowned psychologist, Dr Pippa Grange. For Grange, the solution to England’s underachieving lies not in the unanalysed stats, but in pursuing and redressing the underlying emotional issues. She wants to ask why England players hurry this important task, why they are so desperate to get it over and done (with such repeatedly unhappy outcomes).
“We are probably not going to win the World Cup,” Southgate tells his squad much to the horror of one and all. This is not how England managers are meant to talk. But Southgate is resolved. He’s taking the pressure off. His aim, with Grange’s guidance, is to lift this trophy six years on, in Qatar. For now, the goal is to build confidence, team spirit, trust. Even so (or perhaps because of this change), a minor miracle does happen at the 2018 World Cup: England win a penalty shootout (4-3 against Colombia). Progress.
Graham is such a fine writer, he can have us laughing at the inarticulacy of England captain, Harry Kane (a splendid, layered portrayal by Ryan Whittle) for the greater part of the play, only to use Kane’s lack of facility with words to move us to the verge of tears following his crucial (and uncharacteristic) missed penalty against France in the 2022 World Cup quarter final in Qatar.
By this point, Grange has left the England camp. Graham’s thesis is that this rift (brought about by Southgate’s sudden eagerness to accelerate his agenda for transforming England’s fortunes) is the torn seam that rips apart the whole, admirable project and leads to his dignified but sorry exit in July 2024. As Graham tells it, this reversion to old ways (pressure to bring home a trophy) results indirectly from the pandemic – when the postponement of the 2019-20 Euros led to the finals being staged in England in 2021.
The prospect of finally erasing his own Wembley torment by triumphing at the new Wembley seems to cloud his judgment; patience and thoughtfulness give way to neediness and indecisiveness. A scene is devoted to the disastrously late introduction of Sancho, Rashford and Saka – the three young players who would soon miss those penalties, giving Italy the trophy.
Much of “Dear England” is laugh out loud funny. Southgate’s back room staff, Physio Phil (Martin Marquez), Mike Webster (Mark Bardock) and Steve Holland (Tony Turner) are old school cold-wet-sponge-and-tough-tackles football men. Their resistance to Grange’s innovations is sometimes dismissive, sometimes aggressive, often ridiculous and laughable. The two Gregs (Dyke and Clarke – successive chairs of the Football Association) are mercilessly lampooned, as are a succession of Southgate’s predecessors (Taylor, Eriksson, Capello, Allardyce).
Gunnar Cauthery gives an excellent and amusing impression of Gary Lineker, while socio-political context is wittily provided by marionette-like caricatures of Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Liz Truss.
Eric Dier (Tom Lane) and Harry Maguire (Ryan Donaldson) play crucial cameos, but Josh Barrow deserves special acknowledgment for a quite hilarious portrayal of goalie, Jordan Pickford.
Women’s football is not forgotten. Alex Scott (a convincing rendition by Felixe Forde) appears both as player and presenter, and one of the biggest cheers of the night greets the acknowledgement the Serena Wiegman’s England women’s team did bring home the Euro trophy in 2022.
Liz White renders Dr Pippa Grange, a woman in this quintessentially masculine world, as assured yet sensitive, battling tenaciously against laddish banter and that stubborn male refusal to own up to and address emotional vulnerability. Her character prompts two of the play’s most powerful moments. First, she presses Southgate to talk openly to his players about his feelings regarding that penalty miss. If you can’t lead on this, she tells him, how can they follow? Later on, she shares an immensely touching scene in which she joins in Rashford’s pre-game ritual, which includes saying a few words to his recently departed Nan.
Fans of Spanish football will be gutted that their triumph in 2024 goes unmentioned. The finale jumps straight to Southgate’s resignation and his farewell to the players. Good move!
Even at 2 hours and 50 minutes (including a 20 minute interval), Graham’s facility for short, punchy scenes and Rupert Goold’s tight direction (picked up in this revival by Elin Schofield) make the time fly by. The penalty shootouts are gripping, thanks in part to Es Devlin’s design, ably assisted by Jon Clark’s lighting, and co-sound designers, Dan Balfour and Tom Gibbons (oh, that sound of the ball hitting the back of the net!)
“Dear England” provides conclusive evidence for what the pundits have told us again and again: football is great theatre.
Carmel Thomason
Dave Porter