When it comes to England and the Euros, “noise” has definitely been the word of the tournament. Journalists create the noise , then write and broadcast on how the noise piles pressure on the England players. Players then in turn appear before the same journalists to explain how they are aware of the noise , but are determined to block it out.
The noise loop is born in the early days of the tournament, and grows game by game – fuelled by fan forums and football phone-ins whose entire currency is, of course, noise. The noise exists at decibel levels which most human beings would struggle to live with, because football matters a lot in England . But football matters even more when a major tournament comes along, and millions who would never be tempted to go to a league match on a wet Tuesday night form crowds around TVs (again, a spectacle rarely found in the digital age) – and make of the players heroes or villains, depending on how they play.
If a transcript of the “noise” were turned into a word cloud in recent weeks, “Southgate” would be at the centre of it, in large letters. But when the England manager steered us to the final of the last Euros in 2021, the word “Gareth” would have loomed largest on the word cloud. Football fans felt on first-name terms with that incarnation of the England manager, because Gareth was a hero back then.
Gareth got his players to win with comparative ease, made three-piece suits fashionable again , and made England feel goo.