afternoon gentlemen, my name is Gareth, I would like to tell you my vision for the future of the international team…
thank you for seeing me today, lovely to have so many blazers in one room, pity that the only ladies here are serving tea or working as carers.
Firstly I’d like to clarify that I will stick with senior players well beyond their sell-by dates, unless of course pressured by club managers who tell me who I can pick - the Premier League and the money will come first.
But I’ll warn you now, I’m going to be quite a taskmaster!
I will immediately confirm who is running this show by giving Rooney the captaincy, if he wants it, and I’ll place him in charge of squad discipline.
Furthermore I will see if Lampard, Scholes and Gerrard would consider being in my next squad with the plan to play them out of position - this golden generation needs some old heads to teach the ways of the past, we need to utilise players who have been there, and not done it.
Qualifying campaigns?
Yes, I’m fairly happy we can stumble through them, we have a big game against The Solomon Islands coming up and they are a very difficult side to break down, but if we get a draw there and avoid defeat in Syria, I’m fairly happy we will be in good shape for the next World Cup.
Along the way there will be gritty 0-0 draws against countries that we’ve never heard of, but you gentlemen won’t have to face the press after them, that will be my job to dress up the debacle as a plucky success - and if that fails I’ll do a pizza advert.
As far as tactics go I intend to bring in players who want to wear the shirt, passionate men who can run around the pitch a lot.
Shouty men, leaders who scream the national anthem - these guys will pick themselves over players more suited to the job required.
This will strike a chord with the thicker fans who haven’t noticed the rest of world football leaving us behind - and we need the thick demographic, these are the guys who spend money on the shirts and get Rooney printed on the back.
To further bridge the gap between the fans and the team I also need the sort of players who embrace drinking as a key element of being a professional athlete - if they have nice skin as a result of using Nivea, that is even better, shampoo is a must as well.
I will expect players to be involved in nightclub incidents, preferably prior to big matches - in the past there have been too many public order arrests after games, we need to address this - along with parking in disabled bays, an art that has been lost since the decline of John Terry and Ashley Cole.
We need to build a team ethic too, any squad needs to bond and this is best done by dismissed rape allegations, card schools or excessive gambling.
As far as coaching methods go, I don’t know if you recall the Cambridge United side under John Beck but we will be scouting for players who can kick a ball a really long way and see what happens - I’ll call this the getting it in the mixer and looking for knockdowns strategy.
The great Ajax side of the 1970s did a similar thing, but without the hoofing, or the luck element.
I’ll also be having Belief training, no, not in the Glenn Hoddle way, more of a confidence thing that distracts from obvious technical flaws, we need to try to get players mentally-right so that they can get the rub of the green.
Rather than wasting time on technical skills, decision-making or game plans, I’ll be training players to want it more.
The future?
Yes, good question, I think the main thing we need to do is upscale the non-competitive approach for youngsters.
If we can bring players through from eight-years-old and protect them from the mentally-scarring horrors of a league table or losing a football match, it will prepare them so well for future campaigns.
While youngsters in other countries are being forced to learn life lessons about a work ethic and team spirit within the sporting framework of winning and losing, we need our kids to know they will get congratulated and given a prize even if they put in zero effort.
The hope is that the European Championships and World Cup will go to the everyone wins and gets a prize_ _format by the time this future golden generation becomes slightly more golden.
My only concern with this is if a talented player manages to emerge from our system we need to hold them back so they don’t show up the less-talented ones - though of course everyone is a winner.
I will place Howard Wilkinson in charge of holding back the good players, his track record in this department is second to none.
My contract?
I would like that to be over ten years so I can claim the maximum pay-off after the next World Cup when we all realise that this job is impossible, and you’ll see the bonus scheme that I have written in there.
Every time I am undermined by some decision taken over my head I will be billing for £100k, and every time a newspaper calls me something derogatory I will expect a £25k bonus, up to a maximum of £250k a week.
I have also mentioned a bonus scheme for every time I ignore a player who is the best player in the country in that position but he doesn’t play for the top four.
The last thing we need is in-form players in their correct positions.
One of the new off-the-field schemes I wish to introduce will be the international get together tapping-up sessions.
This should allow the smaller clubs who have players picked (only as a result of injury to big club players) to have their players’ heads turned, thus bypassing the outdated Premier League rules on tapping up.
And that is my vision for the future, thank you for your attention, now my colleague Paul Ince will take questions.
Oh hang on, he’s bottled it and is sitting in the centre circle with his collar up again - I guess I’ll have to take them…it’s got to go better than the last time I stepped up…