Top 99 Quotes & Sayings by Gareth Southgate - Page 2

You always have to be conscious of how your words can provide motivation to the opposition.

You expect the players to fight for their club and fight for their shirt, and when they come together, they are fighting for England.

Good teams, whatever the circumstances or the atmosphere or the pitch, find a way of playing.

I am not sure I will ever wear a waistcoat again, frankly!

In every position on the field, there's really strong competition.

You can never say you've 'made it,' because that's the day you stop progressing and improving.

I expect all the players, even the younger ones, to show leadership in their own way.

My priority is, do my players feel supported from within their dressing room by their own federation?

We want to win every game of football we go into. I don't know how we would go into a game not wanting to win and not wanting to play well.

If we want to be a top team, we can't get to 3-0 and suddenly decide not to play without the ball. We have to play with intelligence right through the game.

Whenever people speak, you give the opposition the opportunity to use those words as they see fit.

I don't think, when you are involved with England, you can ever write any game or tournament off - that wouldn't be acceptable.

You give everything you have, build friendships within your team - in international football, you give everything for your country and play in a way that you hope connects with the fans.

The quality of our academy system is very high, as good as anything in the world. Around the country, lots of people in youth development are keen to get together and find a solution to that 17-to-21 age bracket and how we get those players playing.

I don't think the qualifying fixtures excite people. They're games against countries that we are expected to beat, rightly so, and then how many we score dictates whether it's a good performance or not.

If we are encouraging kids to go into academies, then presumably we are selling them the dream that they can play first-team football.

Looking at the team sheets, you're never quite sure one weekend to the next who's going to be in a team and who isn't.

When you're a leader and a manager, you have to make decisions which are right for your group to achieve the primary objective. Sometimes those decisions will be criticised.

Nobody can tell me that if players are good enough, they will come through. That is not true. There are plenty of players who are good enough.

When the positions of so many managers is precarious, and there isn't long-term stability, I can understand why they are loath to risk.

Sometimes you have to make decisions for the bigger picture.

My players' feeling is the most important thing for me.

I want my players to enjoy playing football and not be scarred by the experiences.

It's very difficult to pick a 17-year-old who's had 10 minutes of first-team football. You're talking about replacing senior players with some 17-year-olds who haven't played Premier League football.

I don't know how you get in the England squad without getting in the Arsenal team.

My job is to allow people to dream. Make the impossible seem possible.

You're always loath to take a player off of his ability.

I think it's always difficult to go against people with big match experience in finals.

My sole focus is producing the best team possible for England.

I'm committed to England, simple as that. I don't need to hedge my bets in keeping doors open or keeping things alive.

I manage every player as well as I possibly can, regardless of which club they're from, what their roots are.

My kids don't think, for one minute, about where people are born, what language they speak, what colour they are. There's an innocence about young people that is only influenced by older people.

I've got to think through all of those things - competition for places, players who need match minutes, and keeping the unity of the squad.

I'm not the authority on the subject. I'm a middle-aged white guy speaking about racism. I'm just finding it a really difficult subject to broach.

Write your own stories.

I think we have seen evidence that being brave enough to go abroad can lead to a proper opportunity.

Very often, you can go into one game and do really well, and then you have to find that level of performance so quickly again.

For me, it is all about the bigger picture and what is right for England. I haven't enjoyed watching us play in all our games, but away in Germany, against Spain and Germany at home, I've enjoyed the performance.

If you keep always doing what you've always done, you get the same results.