Liverpool legend Steven Gerrard has left his post at Rangers to become Aston Villa's new permanent manager. Villa have moved quickly to secure their next head coach after deciding to sack Dean Smith following the team's loss to Southampton last week.
Belgium boss Roberto Martinez had also been linked with the role, but Gerrard has now stepped into the dugout at Villa Park, committing to an initial two-and-a-half-year contract. I would like to wish the players, staff and supporters the very best for the future.
In a statement announcing Gerrard's departure , Rangers said: "Gerrard moves to the Midlands having played a key role in the significant growth of the Light Blues in numerous areas during his three-and-a-half years at Ibrox.
The Liverpool midfielder said: "I have enjoyed every minute of representing my country. It's a sad day for me. Gerrard will now take on a "high profile" ambassadorial role with the Football Association.
He retires from international duty having scored 21 goals and played at six major tournaments. He ranks third on England's most-capped player list behind only Peter Shilton and David Beckham Gerrard skippered England at this summer's World Cup in Brazil, however it was to end in disappointment for Roy Hodgson's team after they exited the tournament bottom of the group and without a victory.
England manager Hodgson said: "While I'm disappointed, I can entirely understand Steven's situation and can have no complaints given the incredible service he has given to his country. On the occasion of his hundredth cap, Gerrard put the figure at no more than six or seven great games.
He winced as he said it, that pained expression so familiar to those who have followed his career as an international footballer.
It was an honest emotion, openly displayed. Like him, it will be missed. The end: Steven Gerrard has retired from international football following failure at the World Cup. Stepping away: The year-old has called time on his England career after caps. Gerrard winced a lot with England. There has probably never been a better England captain at fronting up, but it wounded him to have to fill the role of honest broker so regularly, to defend, to justify, to rationalise.
He was at it again in Brazil last month, sitting side by side with his manager Roy Hodgson, laying to rest another doomed campaign armed only with words. He must have hated that. Gerrard the man of action, reduced to parroting empty statements of hope.
One imagines it would not be his description. One of the greatest players of his generation in Europe, his standards are set considerably higher.
Gerrard was a symbol for England, but not in a way he would have hoped. He came to epitomise the shortcomings of the national team, its inexplicable failings, its one consistency: the ability to disappoint. Gerrard will say he was rarely given his favoured central midfield role, but the problem runs deeper than that. It says something for the parlous state of the England team right now that a player who has so often failed to find a home in international football leaves such a big hole on the occasion of his retirement.
This emptiness implies a magnificent career which Gerrard, sadly, did not have. There were echoes of Bryan Robson in his game, but not in his impact at international level. Up front: Gerrard was always brutally honest when he spoke as captain in his press conferences.
These qualities were not seen often enough in tandem for England but we knew they were there and we lived in constant hope they would surface in a big game. A bit of theirs, a bit of his. He turned in some of his most consistent performances in the qualifying campaign for the World Cup, started in a forward role on the left by Fabio Capello.
He hated it, but played well and was an excellent foil for Rooney. A pity he appeared to see any position bar his favourite as a slight. Ultimately, no footballer of modern times better encapsulates the growing disconnect between club and country than Gerrard.
He was always committed to England, but in the red shirt of Liverpool he was a different class.
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