Edgeley will begin to flutter with crosses of St George. Along Castle Street, where the area’s angling shop sits, a few flags are starting to sprout. Down the way, decorations at the Oak, the Robert Peel and the Albert nod to the patriotism of this little part of Stockport.
The surrounding roads, rows and rows of terraced houses, will become decked out, one by one. By the time Serbia vs England comes around on June 16, the town will, as Phil Foden says, resemble a carnival.
It’s all bringing him back to 2010. The first major tournament he remembers, meticulously filling out a wall chart in his bedroom, a half-a-minute walk from the high street. ‘That used to be so good as a kid, everyone decorating their house,’ Foden says. ‘Just like a party, something to do.
‘Playing now, you get goosebumps. That full stadium roar. The national anthem. It’s something you always saw as a kid growing up knowing you want to be an England player. It’s a feeling I’d love for people to have, that once-in-a-lifetime thing.’
Frank Lampard, the goal that wasn’t, Germany and South Africa – a fairly drab World Cup – are his first memories as an England supporter. You imagine Foden was down the street, on its pedestrianised precinct, banging balls about, ducking and diving between shoppers.
Phil Foden is targeting Euro 2024 glory with England in Germany later this summer
Foden, a McDonald’s Fun Football ambassador, has kept his childlike wonder in the sport
He still has a kickabout with locals when he goes back now because when Foden sees a football, Foden needs to touch it and, even with six Premier League titles at Manchester City and everything else that goes with it, the lad from Edgeley – who turned 24 on May 28 – has held onto that childlike wonder.
‘It’s days like today playing football with local kids. That’s when it really hits home for me’, says Foden in his new role as a McDonald’s Fun Football ambassador, the largest free grassroots kids football programme in the UK.
‘It is great to see them smiling and playing the game I grew up obsessed with. I always had a football at my feet, I never stopped, and I have great memories playing with my mates when I was younger. It is so important that kids have access to free football in safe and accessible spaces.
‘Hopefully they can see how much I enjoy playing and how much fun I have on the pitch. And, hopefully, I can inspire a few to start their football journey and create unforgettable memories like I have.
‘It’s funny, I feel that the City manager (Pep Guardiola) sometimes thinks I’m still that little boy, which I don’t mind,’ he adds. ‘Even when I was walking on stage to get my [Premier League] winner’s medal the other week he said to me: “you’ve grown up now!”. It’s nice to have been on this rollercoaster with him and to have shared so many great memories.’
Fresh from a superb season at Manchester City, Foden is now eyeing up a Three Lions triumph
Pep Guardiola has pushed his dominant City players to extreme levels, Foden has admitted
There is a story that when City were lining up to capture their team photo earlier in the season, Guardiola turned to Foden beside him and suggested he sit up straighter, taller. He smiled, obliged and those shoulders have been back ever since, driving City on to a title with 19 league goals – 27 in all competitions – and winning two significant individual awards.
‘You know the manager,’ he laughs. ‘He still wants more from us and I love that about him, pushing us to extreme levels. I’ve never seen anyone like him. I don’t know how he keeps going with this energy. I couldn’t have had a better person to help me along the way than Pep. He gave me his trust in big games at such a young age and I have to thank him a lot.’
One of the first messages that pinged up on Foden’s phone upon winning the Football Writers’ Association Player of the Year was from the national team coach. Stylistically, Gareth Southgate differs from Guardiola. Yet, in his understated way, he has unearthed something in the younger stars like Bukayo Saka, who have then flourished with their clubs.
‘It was a nice message he sent,’ Foden says. ‘He’ll drop one every now and then. He’s good with that. I think it’s important to stay connected. If he sees someone a bit down then he’ll put an arm around them, bring them in. It goes a long way for the team if a manager does that. You want to go out and fight for him, do you know what I mean? You want to play for him and win for him.’
England will have to do that soon and Foden knows it. With he and Jude Bellingham, who is also a McDonald’s Fun Football ambassador, enjoying such prolific campaigns from midfield, Southgate boasts the armoury to hurt anybody at the European Championship in Germany, with the clamour for that pairing in behind Harry Kane.
When it’s suggested that they are the two who have impressed most across Europe over the past year, Foden modestly turns away from the topic and instead talks up Cole Palmer unprompted. ‘Season of his life,’ he says. And he’s not wrong.
Foden has insisted England’s players are determined to fight for boss Gareth Southgate
But there is a wider point to Foden’s train of thought. He is thinking about the finishers, the sort of buzzword that rattles around the offices of sporting directors and heads of science up and down the country.
Not finishers in the way that Harry Kane bears down on goal. Finishers in the sense of those creative – and often explosive – players who are designed to impact games off the bench when a knockout tie, say Italy in a potential Euro quarter-final, hangs in the balance. That might have been Foden once but not now.
Instead, he is a cornerstone of England’s assault on this tournament. If he doesn’t do it, there are more in reserve than ever before and Palmer – Premier League Young Player of the Year after dragging Chelsea along – happens to be one of them.
‘The players on the bench are just as good and the squad is one of the best I’ve seen for a long time,’ he says. ‘All of these players are in form. If we’re going to win anything you need these guys fighting for the shirt, coming off the bench making a difference.
‘With Cole, it’s effortless. Slows play down, shifts to the side, chops with fake shots. I always saw in Cole that he would score a lot of goals. You can see the instinct straight away in a player. He was one of the best in the five-a-sides (at City).
‘I always knew he would have a brilliant career. You can see it straight away when you’ve got a top player. We both won the awards as well and it’s mad how far we’ve come: to be two top players in the Premier League this season is really a surreal moment.
Now a cornerstone of England’s assault at the Euros but there is more in reserve than ever
Cole Palmer, the Premier League Young Player of the Year, dragged Chelsea along last season
‘There were times I was in his shoes, where I wasn’t playing and would just come on for the odd few minutes. I knew he believed in himself. He was frustrated, he spoke to me a few times saying he wanted to play more football, and he decided to leave. I’m happy for him that it’s worked.’
Two natural street footballers born a few miles apart in the south of Manchester. Foden might have been in Palmer’s shoes yet, raised a City supporter, he was never going to leave. To claim it was all seamless would be to miss the point, though.
Foden was and is unusual in how the nation became so aware of his ability so young and that comes with its pressures. Demands from outside that he go on loan as a teenager when only given a few minutes here and there with his club were persistent over two years. At times, it weighed heavily upon him.
At the start of the 2019-20 season, Foden simply wasn’t featuring. Fit but just on the bench. It was a couple of months after England’s Under 21s had been unceremoniously dumped out of their Euros, with coach Aidy Boothroyd chastised for not picking the slight midfielder whose vision was obvious to many.
He’d played only 10 minutes all season by the middle of September and then sparkled in a 3-2 qualification victory away in Turkey, claiming two assists. When asked about his club prospects later that night, Foden resembled someone a little bit lost. Someone who wanted the public to stop discussing it. Someone who looked on the verge of tears and needed a hug. He is reminded of that and seems to recall the exchange.
‘Yeah,’ he reflects. ‘It’s frustrating sometimes when you know what you’re capable of and you don’t show it. I felt back then, even though I was so young, that I knew what I was capable of doing. Maybe I did get emotional because it means everything to me to perform for City. I had the fire in my belly to do it and I was so determined. That is what makes me as a player, that fire. I always want to prove people wrong and give my all.’
At times, the weight of pressure was heavy on Foden’s shoulders but he is now flourishing
And then he makes a surprising admission. Foden doesn’t mind reading through a bit of negativity online. Granted, it has been hard to find any around him recently.
The idea of thriving off pessimism is something his City colleague Erling Haaland has recently mentioned. Guardiola isn’t overly fond of the idea – and has told players to stay off social media – but Foden rations his browsing. ‘I do look sometimes,’ he says. ‘I’m not on it a lot. It definitely fuels me. It’s proving people wrong. I don’t see anything wrong with it.’
Coincidentally, he’s actually proven a lot of people right. This is the Foden England knew it owned. Five years on from that night in Izmit – two hours east of Istanbul – he finds himself the country’s main creative outlet. A diminutive type who wouldn’t look out of place alongside those Spanish geniuses adorning his wall chart from 14 years ago in South Africa. His face will be on a few of those posters this summer.
How does it go from another hard luck story – in his time, Lampard through to Italy in 2021 and Kane’s missed penalty in Qatar – to glory?
Foden wouldn’t look out of place among the geniuses on his wall charts he owned as a child
‘Look, as an example: a new manager comes into a team and there are new players. Sometimes for that season it’s not going to work until they learn off each other. I feel that’s what the manager has been building with England. Building connections.
‘Over the last few seasons we’re getting better as a team. Because you’re not there long, it takes a little bit more time. I see the team as very strong now and understanding each other a lot more.
‘Sometimes in those big games football is small margins. A big moment. A player can create something from nothing or something goes against you.
‘I feel like in those big ones you almost need a little bit of luck on your side and we’ve been a little bit unlucky. Harry has that pen and if he puts it away then it’s a different story. But it is what it is. It’s just nice to see that we can compete against the top nations and reach those latter stages of tournaments. In the past, England teams struggled to do it. Gareth’s been building for a bit now and we’re stepping ahead in the right direction.’
Phil Foden has joined the McDonald’s Fun Football programme to celebrate thousands of free hours of football coaching being made available this summer for children aged 5-11. Sign up at mcdonalds.co.uk/football.
