England’s new manager is set to confront Spain, another team now without a head coach, in a friendly at Wembley as part of a reciprocal arrangement struck by the countries’ respective football associations after the teams’ meeting in Alicante last season.
The fixture is expected to be scheduled for 14 November, three days after England host Scotland in a World Cup qualifying tie at the national stadium. The team open their campaign in Slovakia on 4 September before a double-header against Malta at home and Slovenia away the following month. A similar friendly is also anticipated in France in 2017 after Les Bleus visited Wembley last November.
The Football Association’s technical director, Dan Ashworth, has started the process of finding a new England manager following Roy Hodgson’s departure last week in the wake of the team’s defeat by Iceland in Nice. He will report back to the FA vice-president, David Gill, and the chief executive, Martin Glenn, though it is unclear how long the process is likely to take. There remains the prospect of the national team starting their World Cup qualifying campaign with an interim head coach in place.
Vicente del Bosque formally left his position with Spain on Monday after eight years in charge, a period which yielded the 2010 World Cup and the 2012 European Championship. He registered 87 wins, 10 draws and endured only 17 defeats in that period but had made clear after his team’s elimination to Italy in the last 16 at Euro 2016 that his intention was to leave the role.
