Leander Schaerlaeckens: Faced with impossible expectations, Roy Hodgson is destined to fail as England manager

England expects more than any coach can deliver, so for its new coach, it can only end one way.

Roy Hodgson stepped through the double doors and into the glaring, blinding lights on May 1, settling into his seat for his official unveiling as England manager. It was a harsher, less forgiving light than any he’d ever faced in 36 years of top-flight management. Suddenly, every blemish on his face was visible – live and in HD. 

It’s been a week since Hodgson was appointed after the job was vacant for almost three months following Fabio Capello’s resignation. It’s been a week since Hodgson got the job even though another man, Harry Redknapp, was the consensus choice of the press and, by extension, the people. It’s been a week since he stopped being, “Roy Hodgson, football manager” and forever became “Roy Hodgson, England manager”.
The dust has settled on his high-wattage appointment, and the outlines of his new reality are stark. If this is the most coveted job in England, it is nevertheless hard to say what, aside from a buxom paycheck, makes it worthwhile.
Hodgson is no longer a man privately employed by a professional soccer club, he’s now public property of the country of England. That has many acute repercussions. His record has become a matter of nationwide discussion. Everything he does will be scrutinized and pored over, again and again, from his selections to his formations to how he handles the Rio Ferdinand And John Terry Situation.
They understand the crux of the matter. As England manager, you can’t really win. Actually lift the trophy against all odds and you’ll have merely done what was expected by a country that forever chases its own tail, getting worked up into a frenzy over the upcoming tournament, wildly overestimates its national team, inevitably is left disappointed and then seeks out a scapegoat. It’s a predictable pattern. Again and again it unfolds. Like clockwork. 
But then Hodgson declared what all England managers must: “I’m even tempted to say the only success is winning.…You’ve always got to go into tournaments to win because we’re a major football nation.”

But England refuses to see it that way, in spite of endless empirical evidence to support the notion that the Three Lions are really nothing special. As England manager, you are expected to deliver world-class results, even if your team is not that.
And so, Hodgson, looking slightly uncomfortable as photographers rattled off hundreds of frames per minute, has accepted a job at which he can only fail. No England manager has left the job as anything but a failure. 
All England managers fail.  Hodgson will too. He may be the most qualified man out there in the eyes of the Football Association, but that will count for little. His tactics will be deciphered, his methods deconstructed, and, ultimately, he’ll be demeaned. Redknapp’s name will come up. 
And, ultimately, he’ll become “Roy Hodgson, former England manager.”