Gareth Southgate has always been a man interested in life outside the football circus. When he played for England, I remember chatting to him at the carousel at Fiumicino airport before a vital France 1998 qualifier in Rome. As he waited for his bag (there’s always baggage with England), Southgate reflected on what he would see on this visit to the Eternal City. Sistine Chapel? Colosseum? La Dolce Vita? No chance. His itinerary was airport, hotel, training ground, hotel, stadium, airport; basically the External City. Southgate accepted his professional lot and looked forward to the day he could return and explore.
He certainly made up for it when he moved to punditry. Covering England and Champions League matches with ITV, Southgate organised outings to see Leonardo da Vinci’s ‘The Last Supper’ before an AC Milan game, to the Prado before a Real Madrid match and to the Warsaw Rising museum when giving expert, occasionally critical, analysis of England at Euro 2012 in Poland.
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