John Barnes: No one thought 'model pro' Gareth Southgate would become a manager

For a time in his playing days, he was known as “Model”, as in “model professional”.

Latterly, Gary Neville has termed him “England’s greatest asset” because of the job he has done as manager.

Overseeing the most successful period for England’s men's national team since 1966 means Gareth Southgate is afforded no shortage of respect.

Semi-finalists at the last World Cup. European Championships finalists three years later. And a campaign ripe with possibilities in Qatar to follow at the end of this year.

So did Southgate always appear destined for such high achievement? Not so, according to John Barnes, his former England squad-mate.

“Gazza [Paul Gascoigne] would say he was boring,” Barnes said of Southgate. “Calling him model pro wasn’t a good thing, because he wasn’t out with the rest of the lads.

“Now it would be like, ‘Look at him, he’s a model pro, isn’t he good?’ Back then, it was like, ‘Flippin’ hell, Gareth, let’s go out.’

“Back then, you wouldn’t have thought Gareth would go on to be a manager. You wouldn’t look at him and think, because he’s a model pro he’d make a good manager.

“Even managers who were great managers back then went out with the lads. Kenny Dalglish was one of the lads, and he won the double. Because times have changed, Gareth is a typically modern manager.”

The international careers of Barnes and Southgate overlapped briefly. The former was phased out of the reckoning just as Southgate was building towards his fateful Euro 96 campaign.

He is unlike any of the managers Barnes played under in his own illustrious 79-cap career, according to the former Liverpool star. Barnes reckons Southgate’s great feat has been in maximising the potential of the players available to him.

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