Roy Hodgson to meet with FA chief executive Martin Glenn to discuss his future as England manager

Roy Hodgson will meet with Football Association chief executive Martin Glenn in the next few weeks to clarify when his future as England manager will be decided, after the first tensions in the relationship between governing body and coach emerged over the weekend.

During the draw for the 2018 World Cup finals qualifying, Hodgson revealed he had not known that Glenn, who took over his role in March, was to announce the “current plan” was that the England manager’s future was not to be revisited until after next summer’s European Championships when his current contract expires. The FA and Hodgson had been united in their stance on the manager’s future but the weekend saw the first divisions between the two parties.

Glenn will meet with Hodgson before the next England game, a Euro 2016 qualifier against San Marino on 5 September, to discuss his situation. His previous agreement with FA chairman Greg Dyke was that there would be talks between now and next summer’s tournament in France on how best to handle the issue but with it now likely to dominate proceedings at the next international break, those discussions will be moved forward.

In interviews on Friday, Glenn said that he believed “uncertainty” was beneficial to performance, and with Hodgson’s contract expiring after Euro 2016 felt that it would encourage the England manager “to go the extra yard to get results”. For Hodgson, a veteran manager who is 68 next month, that kind of psychology is unlikely to go down well and does not represent the best of starts to his relationship with Glenn.

In the past Hodgson has been at peace with a degree of uncertainty over his future beyond Euro 2016, largely because there was a general agreement at the FA that, given the obvious sensitivities, the matter was not be discussed publicly by either side. Glenn’s entrance into the debate, at an event for the Sir Bobby Robson foundation, has been interpreted in some quarters as a clear attempt to make the running in a decision he envisages he will be the key figure.

All four of the board members of the now defunct Club England, which appointed Hodgson in 2012, have now left the FA. The decision on Hodgson’s successor, if there is to be a successor next year, will be made by the new powers within the organisation: Dyke, Glenn and the technical director Dan Ashworth who has overhauled the coaching structure at all levels and was responsible for the appointment of the highly-successful women’s team manager, Mark Sampson.

Hodgson finds himself in a stronger position than a year ago, post-Word Cup finals, following an unbeaten season for England over ten games, the first in 24 years. He is optimistic about his young side’s chances at Euro 2016 next season and realistic about the future. He would not wish to continue were the majority of England fans against it. Were he not to be offered a new contract by the FA, the likelihood is that he would retire from the game

England have gone into tournaments in the past knowing that the manager was on his way out, most notably at the 1990 World Cup finals with Bobby Robson and then with Sven Goran Eriksson at the 2006 finals. Nevertheless, Hodgson’s fear that the speculation over his future would dominate the build-up to the tournament was well-founded.

Previous to the World Cup draw in St Petersburg, Hodgson had been on holiday in the United States and away from FA business - part of the reason that Glenn’s comments caught him on the hop. “Am I happy with it?” he replied in response to a question about Glenn’s remarks. “I don't know. It means there will be lots of speculation the moment we qualify until the tournament itself. Whether that is the right thing, I don't know.”

Up until now, Hodgson’s relationship with the FA has been notably smooth. While Glenn’s belief that England managers’ “long, long contracts” has not been beneficial to the FA in the past - Eriksson and Fabio Capello the most obvious - the position at the FA up until Friday was that it did not wish to undermine Hodgson in any way, even if it chose not to renew his contract post-Euros.