Why Sven should still walk

The Faria affair didn't damn him. But between the lines of the Brooking dossier there are footballing reasons to believe the clock has started ticking on the England coach

Once he was regarded as a desirable piece of apparel for upwardly-mobile English footballing folk, as swanky as a Louis Vuitton bag clutched by ladies who lunch. When, three-and-a-half years ago, the FA's then chief executive Adam Crozier strutted into a St Albans Hotel and presented to us a svelte Swede named Sven Goran Eriksson, there was a feeling that the English game, already enriched by the presence of Arsène Wenger and Gérard Houllier, had finally rejected its parochialism, and embraced a bright new era.

Here was a man who was technically adept, with a cool interior; a character blessed with the footballing intellect of a Professor Stephen Hawking. We convinced ourselves that this was a leader whose actions would be based on solid reason, not guileless instinct.

It was not the murky escalation of events, culminating in the anticipated denouement in another hotel off Marble Arch on Thursday, that finally confirmed the error of those preconceptions. That had already become apparent on a balmy evening at Lisbon's Estadio da Luz in June, when, after a stricken Wayne Rooney had reluctantly departed with a fractured bone in his foot, Eriksson's Achilles heel was exposed. It was evident already that Ikea Man's refusal to look beyond the Flat Pack Four had defined him as a coach of restricted horizons.

But a figure with rather more authority than the rest of us, the FA's director of football, Sir Trevor Brooking, then offered the criticism that in the quarter-final defeat by Portugal "[Wayne] Rooney had become a key factor and we must look at our flexibility to adapt". At that point, even some of Eriksson's advocates began to ponder the wisdom of that enhanced, extended contract Mark Palios had agreed with the Swede.

The contemptible attempted stitch-up of the England coach was no way of disposing of him. For the moment, the knives have been reluctantly returned to the FA councillors' cutlery drawer. It was predictable that Thursday's FA board meeting should conclude that, for Eriksson - in the narrow context of how he may, or may not, have responded to the FA's executive director, David Davies, when questioned regarding his sexual conduct with the latter's PA, Faria Alam - there was "no case to answer".

What it doesn't, and shouldn't, mean is that there are no charges to answer regarding his custody of the England football team. The Eriksson-Alam-Palios ménage à trois and the ensuing Soho Square intrigues have obscured more significant issues; it has perhaps been too easily forgotten now that Brooking, in his technical report on Euro 2004, condemned Eriksson's strategy. While not naming the England coach directly, Brooking could scarcely have been more implicitly damning in his observations.

What Brooking actually said bears repeating. "Against Portugal, we scored an early goal," he said. "But did we sit back too much? Did we get stretched at times? We didn't pass the ball well enough or keep possession, and when you're ahead that's an important element - to keep the ball better than we did."

Brooking also opined that England were short of players who would have "made the difference". That failing cannot directly be attributed to Eriksson. Nevertheless, a man whom Davies described last week as "one of the world's outstanding coaches" should still be capable of offering a potent blend in which such shortcomings are negated by the team's positive qualities.

Thus we are left with a man increas-ingly suffering the ravages of tabloid exposure. Not so much the Ulrikagate affair, but the revelation that Eriksson would have been just as content Singing the Blues, when Roman Abramovich's people came calling, as mouthing the Three Lions. Now we are left to ponder the effects of Fariagate, about which, we continue to be told, Eriksson was always entitled to his "privacy". At the very least, it displays poor judgement by one of the country's most high-profile sports personalities to dally with a junior employee.

As for Ms Alam, now in the clutches of Max Clifford (who should surely rename himself Max Headline Room), she is said by the "publicist" to remain both "fond of Sven" and insistent "he should keep looking over his shoulder". Assuming the latter quote is accurate, on balance, most of us would probably opt for Glenn Close's bunny-boiler in Fatal Attraction.

Anyway, what emerges from Alam's memoirs could yet make uncomfortable reading for those present at the west-London hotel in which the FA board met. Although it is not far from the site of Tyburn gallows, it was evident from the moment the meeting was scheduled that there would be no hangings there. Merely suspended sentences.

Those who have already vacated their chairs - the FA's chief executive,Palios, and director of communications, Colin Gibson - had no option whatsoever, given the reported circumstances of their machinations. Of those remaining, chairman Geoff Thompson's stewardship remains vulnerable, though the difficulty will be to identify a man not restricted by conflict of interest (Arsenal's David Dein, for one) to replace him. Davies is also believed to be susceptible to attack, but is a wily political animal, is on good terms with the Government, and knows, so to speak, where the bodies are buried. He is also an effective communicator.

Yet ultimately the majority of football followers give not a Euro 2004 commemorative coin for the brass hats. The England coach is the beginning and end of their considerations.

The cumulative effect on the England coach of both on- and off-field issues cannot be overstated. Though he valiantly maintains his decorum when chanced upon by the paparazzi, and betrays no evidence of paranoia, Eriksson is aware now that the only contract that interests many England supporters is one put out to end his England tenure.

His detractors have increased since Portugal, not least because the juxtaposition of his enhanced salary with the significantly lesser earnings of Greece's manager, Otto Rehhagel, and Portugal's Luiz Felipe Scolari placed both Eriksson and Palios (the man who had brokered the deal as Eriksson's reward for not going to Chelsea) in such an unflattering light. One unnamed FA board member articulated the board's general feeling: "We will be looking at his results very closely."

Have such people studied England's forthcoming opponents? England are 10th in the official Fifa rankings. In their forthcoming World Cup qualifiers, they face Poland, who are 30th; Wales, 66th; Austria, 69th. As for Azerbaijan, they are 118th. Some examination of Eriksson's worth that lot represent, even without Rooney in the opening matches, in Vienna and Katowice. Eriksson would have to fail dismally for England not to qualify, comfortably, for Germany 2006. It is what happens in two summers' time that would give a true judgement of Eriksson's acumen.

One suspects, though, that he will not remain for the duration. Certainly not if a tempting club offer materialised - and Davies maintains that many covet his services. It would probably be best for all concerned if the FA thoroughly rediscovered themselves. New chairman. New chief executive. New head coach.

However, perhaps they should revert to their old headquarters, because the move to Soho Square has not exactly been fêted with too many auspicious developments. Quite an apt name, too, the old one, remember? Lancaster-Gate.