Brian Barwick Best Quotations

We've got the best part of six months in real terms - the first international after the World Cup is in August - but that will not be the way we play it. I hope the appointment won't be after the World Cup and there's no reason why it should be. We have the opportunity of appointing before the World Cup and the upside of that is they can watch the side they will inherit in August with a sense of semi-distant ownership, and it may well be an advantage.

It would be disrespectful to discuss successors now but the key thing would be to find the best man for the job. If he's English, then so be it.

I'm giving Sven an opportunity to take the best English side since 1966 to a World Cup, and that's my way of saying I have a fantastic degree of confidence in his ability to deliver for us.

We have about five months (to make the appointment). This is not the time to look any further forward than the World Cup. But I have gone on record as saying we want the best man for the job and if that is an Englishman, so much the better.

I am asking Sven to take what I believe to be the best English team since 1966 to the World Cup and try and win it. There was an opportunity for some significant clarification of the situation. We discussed it long and hard and felt the best way forward was him to focus on 2006. And then for him and us to part company in good heart and with good grace.