Football
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Former England boss Roy Hodgson: Players did not grasp instructions

Former England manager Roy Hodgson has told UEFA coaching magazine The Technician that he "overestimated" how much his players understood what he wanted them to do.

Hodgson left his job when England crashed out of Euro 2016 to unfancied Iceland, and has not talked about his time in charge of the Three Lions since then.

But in an interview with the magazine, the 69-year-old said he believed his players had not understood his instructions as well as he had thought.

He revealed that he would ask them "to tell us back what we had been telling them" in an effort to ensure that his tactics had been grasped.

"One of the things I've learned in the last two years was overestimating players' understanding of exactly what you want," Hodgson said.

"In the last couple of years with England, we filmed the training sessions, we filmed the games in wide angle, and we started having meetings in smaller groups.

"We went through things, but we got them to tell us back what we had been telling them."

Hodgson said he believed the written press were "dangerous" and added that it was important for a coach not to feel a need to gain "revenge" on them.

"They can take the words that you say and make it seem very different to how it actually was, but you can't beat them," he added.

"You've got to avoid the temptation to get a sort of revenge the next time you are in front of that media group when you read something you didn't like."

He said it was important that an international manager has "someone with you who you trust and who understands the media world, who can give you some advice before you go into press conferences.

"I think it's dangerous, directly after a game, to go out with the emotions you are feeling because you can make mistakes. You need to settle down."

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