Southgate haunted by heartache of England's World Cup exit

England manager Gareth Southgate admits he is haunted by their World Cup semi-final defeat to Croatia, as he revealed he stayed up until 4am to watch a replay of the match.

England led 1-0 in Wednesday’s dramatic semi-final in Moscow, but their dream of glory died when Croatia came back to win 2-1 after extra-time.

Southgate couldn’t sleep the night after the game at England’s Repino training base, so he switched on a replay of the game.

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“We are twenty minutes from a World Cup final and 10 minutes from a shootout for a place in the World Cup final,” he says. “That is going to live with me forever, there is no doubt about that.

“I’m conscious I had to raise everybody yesterday but I’m up watching the game at four o’clock this morning.

“You will always have in your mind that it was a massive game to be involved in and to be so close is tough.”

Southgate and his team have won plenty of admirers during their memorable campaign, as they reached the last four of the World Cup for the first time since 1990.

And the England boss wants to remember the positives, despite the heartache of their near miss.

Speaking ahead of Saturday’s third place play-off match against Belgium, Southgate added: “I’m old enough now that I don’t have to beat myself up unnecessarily.

“When I was a player I had a very simplistic mindset. Win, I was good, lose and I was an idiot and nothing in between.

“I’m a lot more rational now. I can see what we have achieved, albeit when you are so close you look back at what we might have done.

Balance

“The reality is that we lost a semi-final… but you’ve got to balance that with where do I think this team is, realistically, and what level do I think they are at.

“I think we’ve really got a huge amount out of this group of players and they deserve massive credit.

“If I look at (Jordan) Pickford, (Harry) Maguire, (Kieran) Trippier, they had a handful of caps each coming into the tournament and they have all performed unbelievably well.

“As so have many others who don’t have huge experience so I am hugely proud of what they have done.”

England will head home after the Belgium game to a nation proud of their efforts. Now Southgate will hope to build on this campaign, and make his team genuine contenders to win Euro 2020, where a number of games – including the semi-finals and final – are being played at Wembley.