Ranking every Dear England actor’s ‘accuracy’ from absolute stinkers to best | OneFootball

It’s that time of year when football escapes its usual confines to become part of the wider conversation and, as always for any major tournament, there have been plenty of attempts to capitalise financially on England fever.

The latest is a BBC drama called Dear England, which is based on the play about Gareth Southgate’s revolutionising of the toxic Three Lions dressing room.

That has given us a chance to pick over the bones of their casting choices and here’s the main characters of the England series ranked from the best to the absolute stinkers:

17. Cole Palmer

That’s Lewis Hall right?

Palmer has been done dirty by the casting choice. His actor has big ears, frighteningly small eyes and looks far more like the Newcastle full-back than the Chelsea man.

Still, at least if England do win this summer and another season is made, Palmer’s actor won’t have to make an appearance.

16. Wayne Rooney

The casting requirement for Rooney seems to have been ‘does he have a Scouse accent? Yes. Get him on set.’

Bobby Schofield looks nothing like the Manchester United man. He’s got too much hair, his face has far too much jawline and he is nowhere near as stocky as the real thing.

His height is also a weird thing; Rooney is 13cm shorter than Southgate and yet is often at eye-to-eye level with the gaffer.

Thankfully, Rooney’s actor is not in it as much. He is there as a passing of the torch and to tell Southgate what is really wrong with the England squad.

15. Thomas Tuchel

Anyone who has seen Inglourious Basterds will have a hard time looking at Richard Sammel without immediately picturing him getting his head bashed in with a baseball bat.

Sammel is an incredibly German-looking man. He’s got the sharp features, the reserved way of speaking and the piercing eyes which would work, but Tuchel himself does not look very German.

Tuchel’s features are far softer. His cheeks more puffy, his eyes less piercing and his accent is far softer, perhaps morphed by years living abroad.

Tuchel is not a huge character in this show, showing up at the end to say ‘cheers Gareth, I’ll take it from here’ but it’s a decent enough attempt.

14. Jack Grealish

Grealish appears midway through the second episode as part of a fresh faces following England’s 2018 elimination and is a caricature of the actual man.

The actor, Sam Baker Jones, very much plays up to the ‘Jack Grealish is thick’ stereotype and he is unable to understand questions as simple as ‘where’s home?’

Grealish is also far more Brummie and we reckon they started with the haircut and worked backwards.

13. Eric Dier

The Eric Dier role has been chosen as the one to be the comedic effect in the show, often pointing out ‘awkward silences’ when talks of feelings are involved.

He looks a bit like him but his accent is a bit all over the place. Perhaps fair enough considering Dier’s unusual upbringing.

12. Phil Foden

The most accurate representation of Foden in this series is his differing hairstyles.

After rocking up with a fringe that looks like it was cut with a ruler, he later appears with the lore-accurate bleached blonde hair.

Alfie Middlemiss does look more like a bloke who threw a load of cash at Sepp Blatter than the City playmaker.

11. Jude Bellingham

Bellingham turns up towards the end of the series and immediately becomes a bit of a dressing room problem which, by several accounts, is quite accurate.

He refuses to listen to Southgate at half-time as England trailed Slovakia and Harry Kane has to shout at him to ‘listen to the boss’.

All in all, Bellingham comes away as quite unlikeable and in keeping with several media assumptions about the player.

10. Jordan Pickford

Jordan Pickford’s longevity and the fact he is a little bit nuts mean he is one of few in the England squad to break into the mainstream and is therefore a central character in this adaptation.

Josh Barrow is Pickford if his mannerisms were turned up to 11. If any of this sports psychology mambo jumbo is too difficult, Pickford is the voice of the squad.

Even the way he steps out of cars is with the same bravado as if he had just saved a winning penalty in a shootout.

9. Bukayo Saka

Bukayo Saka has a big ‘child on a school trip vibe’, rocking up to his first squad meet-up and talking about what his favourite chocolate is (the one with the caramel if you’re asking.)

Saka is not a huge character in the drama, only really being a presence when he was racially abused alongside Rashford and Sancho, but it’s a decent enough attempt at a portrayal.

8. Jordan Henderson

Henderson’s actor looks like the kind of person who does magic tricks on a cruise ship after his quest to become a famous DJ didn’t go to plan.

He is much more chiselled than his subject, making him look like he comes from Essex rather than Wearside, but his accent is at least passable.

7. Dele Alli

Lewis Shepherd’s portrayal of Dele Alli seems interested in anything that isn’t football which does seem accurate of the man himself.

As for looks, Alli can feel a little hard done by, given his actor has a far higher hairline and looks far older than the intended target.

6. Jadon Sancho

Riess Fennell has got the looks down of Sancho and upon writing this, I realised that I don’t think I’ve ever actually heard Sancho in real life talk.

The media-shy man is most involved during the racism scandal following Euro 2020 but is otherwise a background character. Much like his latter football career.

5. Harry Maguire

While it would only be possible to recreate the ‘slabhead’ nature of Harry Maguire with expensive machinery and granite, Adam Hugill does at least have a fairly decent resemblance to him.

He’s got the square jawline and his hair has been dyed to the right shade of black.

4. Raheem Sterling

For what Francis Lovehall lacks in looks compared to Sterling, he does at least sound just like him.

Sterling’s main scene in episode one is to make a joke about Dele Alli that leads to a near punch-up in the England dressing room and if that doesn’t seem like something he would actually do, it sounded like him at least.

3. Marcus Rashford

Edem-Ita Duke has done a very good job in portraying Rashford and if he does not look exactly alike, the way he speaks and acts is spot on.

Rashford becomes the main focus in the third episode when he is subject to racist abuse after daring to miss a penalty, something Duke portrays well.

2. Harry Kane

Will Antenbring may not look exactly like the England captain, but he does a bloody good portrayal of him.

Kane has quite a unique way of speaking with his voice seemingly coming from deep behind the nose and Antenbring nails that.

It is perhaps fair to say Kane is also somewhat of a teacher’s pet and the actor also gets that spot on with almost any confrontation or team meeting led by the striker.

1. Gareth Southgate

It seems like the makers of Dear England stumbled upon Joseph Fiennes and decided to work backwards.

Fiennes, brother of Voldemort Ralph, is the spitting image of the ex-England boss. Comb the hair, trim the beard and add a waistcoat and you may well be looking at the man himself.

Fiennes has also got the way Southgate speaks down to a T, speaking so softly that it could stop a falling egg from cracking on the floor.