Eddie Howe 'would be mad' to ditch trophy-pursuit with Newcastle United for England job

Gareth Southgate scattered the pigeons when he said that if England don't win the Euros then this will probably be his last tournament as an international manager. Straight away the drums started beating - Eddie Howe is the man the Football Association will turn to if Southgate ends his long reign this summer.

Well, I will give the FA a bit of advice: forget it! I don't think for one moment that right now Howe wants to turn away from Newcastle United or that the club would willingly sacrifice him for the good of the nation. Eddie, I believe, wants to stay and win trophies at club level and the owners are happy for his hand to be on the tiller.

Of course the FA would fancy Howe. That is a different matter altogether. He is the perfect fit.... clean cut and presentable, wonderful in press conferences talking with authority and conviction without giving a solitary single thing away, and a dream at man management.

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However on the other side of the coin why would Eddie want the job? Why would he want to leave Newcastle when the club is only going to get stronger and stronger and trophies will inevitably follow. He is far too young and far too ambitious to want to give it all up. England is for later in his career.

I believe United's boss loves to work daily with his players out on the training ground. With England you see them once in a blue moon and spend the rest of your time travelling all over the country and sitting in cold, windy stands watching matches.

Quite frankly Eddie would be mad to give up what he has got to occupy an office at the FA. The day to day running of a football club has huge attraction and so does buying and selling players, making decisions on who you want and chasing them. There is none of that with England.

The national job was made for Southgate who is an FA man. He was much less comfortable I felt when he was in club management at Middlesbrough. That was cut throat.

There is a reasonable chance that Gareth will go this summer. England have a decent squad and will qualify for the knock out stages all right but for the life of me I don't see how they are favourites to win the whole thing. And if they don't...

England normally flatter to deceive at the big tournaments falling just short of the major prize and while they can end our long wait for silverware in Germany I am not sure that they will. Oh, they will beat Serbia in Sunday's opener and top their group but that is when it gets sticky.

I believe that both Newcastle players, Anthony Gordon and Kieran Trippier, are a shoo-in for the match against Alexandar Mitrovic and Co. Southgate was right to axe Jack Grealish who had had a poor season at Manchester City and take Gordon who has been flying with Newcastle. Gordon has to start on the left wing and Trippier should be picked behind him at left-back because Luke Shaw is too much of a risk because of injury. He has to be introduced gently as the tournament goes on and he gets more training under his belt.

It's going to be interesting to watch how England's defenders handle Mitro who will try to bully them. I have a lot of contacts at Fulham, a club where I both played and managed, and he was unquestionably a cult hero down there. Certainly he scores a pile of goals.

I never liked him at Newcastle because I thought his attitude was all wrong but he had matured and rid himself of some of his unsavoury aspects. He'll be a handful but I expect England to get the job done, with a little difficulty or not.