Harry Redknapp says Gareth Southgate did not deserve the beer mug incident at the European Championship

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Harry Redknapp said Gareth Southgate did not deserve to have angry football fans throwing beer mugs at him at the European Championships.

The England manager has faced a lot of criticism over England’s performance in the tournament, and fans apparently threw beer mugs at him after they drew 0-0 with Slovenia in the group stages of the competition. However, former football manager Redknapp stressed there was “no room” for that.

He spoke on Good Morning Britain on Thursday after England beat the Netherlands 2-1 to secure a place in the final.

What, how and why?

Presenter Kate Garraway noted that there had been a lot of criticism of Southgate and asked if it was justified. Redknapp replied: “Well, I don’t want to see people throwing beer and stuff like that. There’s no place for that… You know, he doesn’t deserve that.”

“But you get criticised by the press and the media when things don’t go well,” he continued. “It didn’t go well for the team. We have to be honest.”

“We were lucky. We scored a goal in the last second. We won on penalties against teams that were really inferior to us. So we didn’t exactly make a splash in this tournament.”

Presenter Ed Balls considered how Southgate might have felt during the game against the Netherlands and discussed why he decided to substitute Harry Kane and Phil Foden.

Redknapp said: “You have to take risks.” “As a football manager you live and die by your decisions and last night they definitely worked,” he added.

“You know, if it doesn’t work out, you’ll be criticised for taking off Phil Foden, our best player. If we’d been beaten, you’d be slaughtered for that. So yes, it’s a gamble.

“You know, you can sit there and do nothing, but you have to make decisions. That’s your job as a football coach. Anyone can question your decisions. Everyone is watching the game. And everyone has a different opinion about what you should do.”

“But in the end you have to make your own decisions. And that’s what Gareth did. And last night it worked. So it was fantastic for him.”

Redknapp described the win against the Netherlands as “fantastic”. “We were criticised a lot throughout the tournament, we didn’t play particularly well,” he said.

“But last night I thought we were fantastic in the first half and played great football. It was very close. In the second half the game was really hanging in the balance until Ollie Watkins came on and scored that fantastic goal. What a great finish.”

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