Southgate was the ambassador England had needed all along

Departing manager proved the impossible job could be cracked with patriotic virtues of modesty and empathy

- David Hytner

Gareth Southgate did not want The Impossible Job. The clue was in the title and it really did feel as if they were the words that followed any reference to the role of England manager. It went even deeper for Southgate, of course - back to Euro 96 and his decisive penalty miss in the semi-final shootout defeat by Germany.

Southgate was scarred for life.

He was too scared and when the job came up after Roy Hodgson's departure following the Iceland disaster at Euro 2016, Southgate made clear he was not interested. He felt he had let everybody down during that much-romanticised summer 20 years previously and there was no way he would run the risk of doing so again. And yet this was not to be his path.

Before the dismissal of Sam Allardyce offered Southgate a second shot at the post in September 2016, he remembered watching Chris Coleman, the Wales manager and a former Crystal Palace teammate, give a victorious post-match interview. Coleman's confidence had been dented by sackings at Fulham and Coventry as Southgate's had by his dismissal at Middlesbrough - and yet he had found the courage to step up and manage his national team.

Coleman stared into the screen and said it was all about not being afraid of going for things in life and, for Southgate, it was as if his old friend was talking directly to him. It was a lightbulb moment. When the Football Association offered Southgate the England job again, initially on an interim basis in the post-Allardyce chaos, he accepted and with a vow to himself.

Southgate would not hide under the covers. He would throw them back every day, jump up and give everything he had, every ounce of positivity, in the pursuit of success. Moreover, his can-do attitude came from a personal place, true to the values he had always held dear.