While Eriksson yesterday insisted Gareth Southgate had not been discarded for good there would appear to be a a vacant place for a defensive understudy on offer for Terry.”He has improved very much in the last year,” Eriksson said “He is more mature, quicker, and plays more regularly. For Eriksson it is a useful warm-up ahead of next month’s European Championship qualifier in Macedonia but for John Terry it will be far more significant. We don’t talk about the weather or cars.”Cars must have been a topic at a previous meeting with Abramovich because Eriksson added, intriguingly, that he was surprised the Russian bought Chelsea but he had previously spoken of investing either in a football club or a Formula 1 team.Eventually conversation turned to tonight’s friendly at Portman Road. If I talk to Ars? [Wenger] or [Alex] Ferguson we talk football. He was sorry he was always linked with jobs, in England, Spain and Italy, but also “honoured”.Eriksson added: “The meeting should not be a problem to anyone. It was to have a cup of tea with a friend, not to discuss a contract with a club. I have been many times to the house of David Dein [Arsenal and FA vice-chairman] I hope I am not supposed to be the next Arsenal manager Of course we talk football.

Eriksson added that he had since spoken to Claudio Ranieri, the incumbent Chelsea manager, but had not said anything about the issue as “there was nothing to say”. The meeting had simply been one of “friends” and he had no reason to be “embarrassed” when it became public. Abramovich, he said, had not asked him to take over at Chelsea either in the summer or at some theoretical time in the future. However, as Graham Taylor, Kevin Keegan and Glenn Hoddle found out before him, once the media have turned, en masse, against an England manager it is simply a matter of time.Should that happen Eriksson insisted he did not have a bolthole ready for him at Stamford Bridge. Let’s be positive.”Eriksson is under contract until 2006 and should he and the Football Association stand firm he could theoretically survive missing out on the championships. Gesturing to the assembled newspaper correspondents, he added: “You will be very important – but let’s not talk about not qualifying.

“None of you would want me, so any move would be easy,” he said.Asked to clarify this comment, he said it was “half joke, half-true, but more true than joke”. The bucolic setting has not, however, screened Sven Goran Eriksson from the harsh realities of his post.
Interrogated on his faithfulness in the wake of his untimely assignation with Roman Abramovich, the new owner of Chelsea, the England manager yesterday admitted his position would become untenable anyway should England fail to qualify for Euro 2004. England have been preparing for tonight’s friendly with Croatia in the country’s “bread basket” this week. This “other Essex”, where Victoria plums, goose eggs and manure are sold at the garden gate, is a world away from the better-known urban one notorious for Ford Cortinas and blonde highlights. They include Christoph Metzelder, Torsten Frings, Dietmar Hamann, Christian Ziege, J?B? and Jens Nowotny.Italy will not be at full strength either, missing the AC Milan defender Alessandro Nesta and Inter Milan midfielder Cristiano Zanetti..