Harry's Game: if Harry Redknapp became the England manager (episode five)

 Harry Redknapp’s England arrived at the Euros in Switzerland with infectious and indefatigable energy, passion and belief. The media milieu were treated to the usual amalgam of player praise and pub-style humour in his press conference – the kind of tour de force very few could manage.

After the Swiss pummelled Turkey 4-0 in the tournament opener, England recorded a 1-0 victory against old foes Portugal. Afterwards, ‘Arry and his coaching staff walked into a pub unannounced, chatting for hours with the lifelong Man United fan from the Home Counties, the bitter West Ham fan, the Chelsea fan who had somehow only been a Chelsea fan since 2003 and the Newcastle fan who genuinely believed his club should be winning the Premier League! The team and their supporters were dovetailing in a way they hadn’t since the heady days of Euro 96’, and there was a sense that the peak of ‘Arry’s alchemy had yet to be reached.

Despite posting 23 shots on goal, the Three Lions were held to a goalless draw by the hosts (as elsewhere Portugal beat Turkey 2-0), after which Michael Owen reminded BT Sport viewers that when England don’t score, they hardly ever win (and that “players these days have to use their feet”). Not one for the drearily punitive exercise of post-mortem, the gaffer organised an evening of karaoke to ease the tension, followed by a trip to a casino in the mountains to splurge a sum of money comparable to the GDP of a small, neutral, landlocked country.

During the latter, an unknown number rang Redknapp’s mobile. It quickly became apparent that this was either another fake sheikh or another Newmarket glass collector masquerading as a jockey; no way was he going to be tripped up this time!

England’s final group match ended in a comfortable 5-0 win over hopeless Turkey, with the Swiss also advancing after hanging on for a 1-1 with Portugal (saving a first-half penalty). Harry was applauded into the press room post-match; his elevation into that exclusive club of Greatest England Managers seemed inevitable now. Those fabled man-management methods would only age if the globe stopped spinning, and the tournament was looking very appealing indeed: Austria their quarter-final opponent, having finished above Croatia and Denmark in Italy’s group.

“Yes Sandra, I still eat 5 pieces of fruit and veg a…month. And no, don’t worry, I don’t wash raw poultry when I’m cooking; I just lick all the dirt off with my tongue. I’ve hardly eaten any sweets either, you know – I remember you looking at my sweet-stash-drawer back home and proclaiming it ‘diabetes in a drawer’, well let me tell you, no such drawer exists here. And anyway, even if it did, I’d rather have diabetes than…dire faeces, which incidentally, was one of the complications your Auntie Ethel had towards the end…Hello?”