But if you believe that Eriksson wasn't spending a sizable chunk of his time learning about the English game, liaising with coaches and officials and tracking the progress of his future players, you probably also believe that Colombian drug dealers killed O.J. Simpson's wife.

England would not have invested nearly US$50 million on a coach without getting his input right away. The stakes are simply too high. They need him badly and they need him now.

Throw in the fact that it is never easy to play for a manager who has already announced he is leaving in six months' time and the effects on Lazio were inevitable.

Footballers don't like uncertainty. The last time it emerged that a high-profile coach was leaving a club at the end of the season, the results were disastrous. It happened at Juventus in 1998-99, when Marcello Lippi signed a pre-contract with Inter Milan. The team fell apart and he was let go a few months later.

Lazio needed a breath if fresh air. It needed to get out of the F.A.'s shadow and it did the right thing in replacing Eriksson with Dino Zoff.

The former Italy boss will provide a viable interim solution. Don't read too much into his eighteen month contract: Lazio's sights are set on Valencia's Hector Cuper (available this summer, if he doesn't re-sign) and on Arsenal's Arsene Wenger (under contract until June 2002 -- when Zoff's contract also expires -- but Cragnotti hopes to lure him earlier).

Meanwhile, there is a Christmas morning atmosphere at the Football Association. Chief Executive Adam Crozier, who looks about 12 years old anyway, gleefully unwrapped his present, saying that Eriksson was "one of the top three managers in the world."

Whether he is or not is highly debatable -- is he better than, say, Sir Alex Ferguson, Fabio Capello, Louis Van Gaal and/or Giovanni Trapattoni?

The real question is what he can achieve with England.

And the prospects might not be as bright as Crozier hopes.

For starters, Eriksson rarely has an immediate impact on a team. In fact, three of the four Serie A clubs he has managed actually did worse in his first season in charge than they did in the last season under his predecessor.

It takes him time to build success and doing so at national team level inevitably takes longer than at club level because you can't simply go out and buy players: you have to make do with what is on offer.

Affecting change in the England set-up means working on coaching at youth level, building an academy system, changing what in many cases remains a prehistoric mentality. All things that take time.

He has a staunch ally in Crozier, a guy whose posterior is as much on the line as Eriksson's, but the question remains: Will he be given time?

Already, the issue of a foreigner managing England has been bitter and divisive. Major footballing powers simply do not look abroad for managers, especially not when they have a top-notch domestic league right on their doorstep.

The fact that a sizable portion of the English press is fiercely loyal to Terry Venables, the man who was passed over for the job, and will pounce on the slightest mistake makes the outlook become all the more bleak.

Part of his appeal is that Eriksson will bring a tactical awareness and technical sophistication that the English game hasn't had in a long time. The problem is you can only do so much as coach of the national team, when you only see your players for a couple of days at a time.

England does have young talent in guys like West Ham's Joe Cole and Michael Carrick, Newcastle's Kieron Dyer and Leeds United's Jonathan Woodgate. While they would probably benefit immensely from Eriksson's coaching, the single biggest influence on their development will still be their club managers. That will not change.

Coaching a national team is about evaluating talent, building a cohesive unit in a short time and being able to make tactical adjustments quickly.

How does Eriksson rate in those departments?

His talent evaluation is good, but not great. Last summer he off-loaded Sergio Conceicao and Matias Almeyda to get his hands on striker Hernan Crespo. Both are now having stellar seasons, while Crespo has blown hot and cold. More worryingly, their sale left Lazio with gaping holes on the right side of midfield and in front of the back four -- shortcomings that Eriksson was unable to properly address in the transfer market.

With a few notable exceptions (Conceicao above all), most players admire and respect Eriksson. This is the good news. The bad news is that even in Lazio's successful title run last season there were rumors of a split between the Eriksson loyalists (Sinisa Mihajlovic, Roberto Mancini, Simone Inzaghi, Attilio Lombardo) and the South American continengent (Diego Simeone, Marcelo Salas, Juan Sebastian Veron, Almeyda). Again, he can't afford a rerun with England.

Tactically, at least, he'll be an upgrade over his predecessors. He is flexible, pragmatic and knows how to adjust his system to his players.

It is no exaggeration to say Eriksson is England's biggest gamble yet. Whatever happens, it will be an interesting ride.

Based in London, Gabriele Marcotti writes a weekly column on international soccer for CNNSI.com.