Trent Alexander-Arnold has made his feelings known on the current England manager situation in his response to Gary Lineker's criticism towards the Three Lions during Euro 2024 .
Led by Gareth Southgate, England reached a second successive European final this summer but not without their fair share of doubters along the way. The team offered a number of unconvincing performances despite topping their group, before scraping their way past Slovakia and Switzerland on their way to the final four.
It was during those group-stage games, especially, that the players were hounded for lackluster displays, having narrowly beaten Serbia before dragging themselves through draws against Denmark and Slovenia. Lineker, in particular, was very vocal with his thoughts.
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Alexander-Arnold claims that the Match of the Day host's comments helped to galvanize the team spirit - and admitted the players felt the same way. Speaking to the Mirror , he said: “We had all seen it and heard it and felt it. We all knew that we could be playing and performing better.
“It is never nice for someone to point that out but everyone deep down knew it within ourselves too. So it was something that we were already thinking about anyway, we knew we needed to be playing better. We had to add that to our performances, some players may have used that as motivation."
However, the 25-year-old conceded that whoever the next England manager is, they'll have to deal with the same criticism should England offer a similar standard of performance as in those first few games in Germany.
Naturally, there are high expectations for England due to the abundance of talent within the squad, and rightly so given recent performances at the last four major international tournaments. But Alexander-Arnold concedes it won't just be the players who will be expected to turn up.
“Whether that kind of criticism led to Gareth leaving, I don’t know," the Liverpool right-back said "Everyone has a high expectation with England now and rightly so, it is true of us as players. We feel we should be winning tournaments, that is the goal and standard we have set ourselves. That will be there for the new manager.”
Southgate, despite his numerous critics suggesting otherwise, did enjoy a successful tenure with the Three Lions, even if there was no trophy. After taking over following England's embarrassing 2-1 defeat to Iceland in the last 16 of Euro 2016, expectations couldn't have been lower.
Now he's got the Three Lions reaching back-to-back European finals, but it's someone else's turn to lead the way . Next up is getting promotion out of their Nations League group, before dealing with the 2026 World Cup in two years' time - and whoever takes the reins must be prepared for the inevitable backlash if things don't go to plan.
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