I hesitate about pontificating on a subject on which I know next to nothing. I cannot pronounce on the qualities of Mr. Southgate and his team as footballers, but I think that I am qualified to comment on their apparent role as national saviours. They are good, decent, well-intentioned people with an admirable social conscience : but footballers cannot heal a fractured society ; they cannot guide us to a society purged of racism ; and they cannot heal gaping inequalities (quite apart from the fact that the 'industry' of football, for this is a very apt description, actually exemplifies many of the inequalities which its players very sincerely oppose). In other words, footballers cannot be politicians ; nor should we expect them to be ; nor should we expect them to clear up the messes left by the failure of politics. Politics has to heal itself ; no external force will do so. If politics has made our society fractured, politics will have to mend it. There is no substitute for the despised, messy, compromised, unglamarous, yet essential practice of politics.
It is no accident that footballers have been assuming political rolea at a time when politicians, such as Alexander de Pfeffel and Donald Trump, have decided to assume the role of entertainers. Indeed, it could be siad that both are entertainers masquerading as politicians, although Alexander has managed to fool more people that he is a politician. At a time when politics has decided to evacuate itself of agency and content, the vacuum is filled by forces in civil society outwith the political class. This is not a liberation, but rather a journey down a cul-de-sac.