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Terry Venables has agreed to stay on as Steve McClaren's assistant with the England team despite his opposition to the reinstatement of David Beckham in the squad - but there are no guarantees that he will stay for the whole Euro 2008 campaign.
Venables was bluntly over-ruled by McClaren in the decision to bring Beckham back.
As the debate over the merits of Beckham's return rumbled on yesterday, details emerged of the decision-making process which saw the 32-year-old brought back.
While McClaren had previously discussed major issues with Venables and the rest of his inner circle - such as the decision to drop Beckham in August - he made this latest call unilaterally and presented it to his staff as a done deal.
The England manager was aware Venables was opposed to Beckham coming back because his assistant had fully backed his plan to cast the player out after the World Cup finals in June and had counselled against bringing him back for the games against Israel and Andorra in March.
When the Beckham issue finally came up for consideration ahead of selecting the current squad, McClaren sought opinions but his staff were made well aware that nothing would sway him.
With his back against the wall, and nothing short of a victory against Estonia in the Euro 2008 Group E qualifier next week enough to keep his job, McClaren has decided to go it alone.
He has been left dazed by the criticism he has received after the Croatia, Israel and Andorra games leaving England fourth in the group, and, it is understood, come to one conclusion: as it was him alone taking the stick, it may as well be him alone who makes the decisions.
While McClaren leaned on the experience of Venables in his early months in the job, they reached a critical point when the 3-5-2 system that the older man had championed failed so badly in the 2-0 defeat in Croatia in October.
Since then McClaren has relied less upon Venables and made more decisions independently, albeit with mixed results. Venables, now 64, has enjoyed his involvement with the England team and remains a very popular coach, but the principles of the team that he and McClaren agreed upon last August have now been changed fundamentally by Beckham's comeback. Venables was not only opposed to the former England captain's involvement from a football point of view but he also believed that the player's huge global fame and all the attendant pressures that brought were unnecessary.
Whether Venables stays or goes will be rendered irrelevant if England fail to win in Tallinn on Thursday week because McClaren - and in all likelihood his backroom staff, too - are certain to be sacked.
At the moment, the atmosphere between the two men is said to be cordial but the long-term future of the partnership is in doubt.
In his News of the World column Venables pointedly avoided the question of whether Beckham should have been in the squad or not. The only faint support he could give McClaren over the decision was to say: "Whether you think he is right or wrong, at least credit him with making the call." It hardly amounted to an endorsement.
McClaren said on Sunday the decision to pick Beckham had been made "to help me win the game - end of story".
The Real Madrid man is almost certain to start on the right side of midfield against Brazil on Saturday and then against Estonia - especially since the withdrawal of Aaron Lennon with a twisted knee.
The England manager has already said that he expects Steven Gerrard to play in the middle and Joe Cole on the left. Now he faces a decision between Frank Lampard and Michael Carrick for the second central place.
While Lampard is the more established of the two, he was dropped for the Andorra game in March in favour of Owen Hargreaves, now injured, a decision that was badly fudged at the time by McClaren.
While McClaren then protested that Lampard's broken wrist ruled him out - an injury that did not prevent him missing a single Chelsea game - that was a convenient way of avoiding telling him he was dropped.
With McClaren now committed to playing Gerrard alongside a holding midfielder in the style of Hargreaves, Carrick fits that role much better than Lampard.
McClaren has not seen Beckham play live this season, but he has read the Real Madrid ProZone stats which, he claims, prove his fitness.
"Opinion will be divided," the England manager said. "People will think it is brave or stupid but it is my decision."
- INDEPENDENT