Jamie Carragher insists England’s ‘Golden Generation’ did NOT fail to live up to their potential

Jamie Carragher says ‘a better manager’ than Sven-Goran Eriksson could have led England’s golden generation to the final of a major tournament, but they would not win it.

The 38-cap defender discusses the gifted group of the 1990s the Three Lions in new book How to win the cup: secrets and insights from top managers of international football and argues that a broader look at the strengths of other national teams should be taken at the time, not just England’s team overview.

Still, Carragher doesn’t believe the golden generation tag was unfairly attached to a group that included David Beckham, Michael Owen and Rio Ferdinand, even if it means people are now looking back at that era with nostalgia.

“The golden generation tag was probably given rightly – if you look at some of the players in the England squad, there were world class players – but it probably didn’t help,” Carragher said in a statement. How to win the World Cup.

“What you have to remember is what other countries had at the time, like the French and the Spaniards. You think how strong the competition was and they definitely had better squads [than England].

“We didn’t underperform by not winning the World Cup, if I’m very honest, if you look at those teams and countries, they had better players than us.”

Despite rejecting the idea that England should have won trophies at the time, he does admit that they should have reached more than three consecutive quarter-finals at tournaments between 2002 and 2006.

And the Liverpool legend admits that while Sven was ‘respected and loved’ by the English players at the time, the Swedish boss has to take some responsibility for that underperformance.

“If we start very well in terms of qualifying and reaching the quarter-finals, you can’t say he’s” [Eriksson] did poorly, but with that group of players a better manager could have gotten England to a final or at least a semi-final,” said Carragher, who played for England between 1999 and 2010.

“It could have been the case with the teams he chose. He always chose the best players, but I don’t think anyone thought ‘what is he doing with that team?’ and there is always discussion about one or two positions in a team.

“Sometimes he was criticized for always playing the big names and more often than not the big names are the best players, but do they make the best teams?

“Maybe substitutions in games or doing something else before a big game might get you over the line.”

How to Win the World Cup: Secrets and Insights from International Football’s Top Managers (Bloomsbury) by Chris Evans is out now and features exclusive interviews with the likes of Luiz Felipe Scolari, Sir Geoff Hurst and Roberto Martinez.