Gareth Southgate steps down as England manager: 'It's time for a change'

The clues were there all along with Gareth Southgate, but in the midst of a tournament run, not everything is always as it seems.

This time it was.

Southgate resigned as England head coach on Tuesday, less than 36 hours after his team fell 2-1 to Spain in the Euro 2024 final, his decision somehow feeling like a sudden shock and yet no surprise at all.

Through the past month, Southgate spoke earnestly and often about the reasons why he had taken this thankless job to begin with, how his primary push was that he wanted to leave English soccer in a better place than he'd found it when accepting the post in 2016.

He's done that, despite defeat in a second-straight Euros final meaning the country's agonized wait for a major trophy will now extend to at least 60 years.

"As a proud Englishman, it has been the (honor) of my life to play for England and to manage England," Southgate's statement read. "It has meant everything to me, and I have given it my all.

"But it's time for change, and for a new chapter. Sunday's final in Berlin against Spain was my final game as England manager."

England has such a complicated relationship with its men's national team, mostly because it's been hurt by all those false dawns down the generations. This was a real window of opportunity, Southgate overseeing a sustained period of reaching the later stages of World Cups and Euros, his "worst" showing being a narrow quarterfinal loss to France at Qatar in 2022.

Yet getting that close and not quite getting over the line — so desperately close on penalties in the final at Euro 2020 — has been used against him. Not brave enough, they said. Not imaginative enough. Not able to get the best out of an extraordinarily talented group.

Southgate left of his