Harry Redknapp, the Tottenham Hotspur manager, has said he would be happy to take over from Fabio Capello should the Italian quit following England’s dismal World Cup exit.
A 4-1 thrashing by Germany led to calls for Capello to resign and the Italian, whose contract with the Football Association runs until 2012, admitted he was considering his position.
“I’m English, who wouldn’t want to manage England?,” Redknapp said. “There’s not an Englishman - whether it’s me, Roy Hodgson or Sam Allardyce - who would turn the job down because it’s our country and we want to manage our country.
“No-one is ever going to turn that job down.”
With both Capello and Sven-Goran Eriksson having been in charge of England recently, Redknapp said it was time for the job to revert to an Englishman even if Steve McClaren’s recent tenure was less than impressive.
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“Could you imagine an Englishman managing the Italian national team? It doesn’t happen,” Redknapp added. “The Germans are the same, they have a German manager. We’ve ended up with two foreign managers.
“This guy (Capello) has a fantastic record at club level. But look, we’ve had a go with it now. When he finally moves on, in four years or whatever, surely there has to be a young guy or somebody in this country, surely we have to find a manager from England, an English manager.
“I’m not talking about a Scottish manager or an Irish manager, I’m talking about an English manager because this is where we’re from, this is our country.
“We should be able to produce someone who can manage the England football team and let’s be honest, they can’t do any worse than what they’ve (Eriksson and Capello) done.”
But Redknapp said the players had to take their share of the blame after coming up against Germany as a result of failing to win their group.
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“The players haven’t performed,” Redknapp said. “The whole package hasn’t worked in this World Cup. I was England all the way and really thought it was our big chance, the best chance we’ve had of winning the World Cup since 1966. It’s been a massive disappointment.
“We were average against the USA. We were disgusting against Algeria. We were better against Slovenia, but what a poor team they were. They’d be lucky to survive in the Championship.”