Roy Hodgson is to step down as Crystal Palace manager at the end of the season, the 73-year-old declaring that the time is right to move away from the 'rigours of top-flight Premier League football.'
With supporters allowed back into grounds, Hodgson will get a well-deserved ovation when Palace host Arsenal on Wednesday having taken over at Selhurst Park in September 2017.
Being offered the Eagles job meant the chance to join the club he supported as a youngster and also the opportunity for Hodgson's reputation in England to bounce back from his final game in charge of the national team - the horror show against Iceland at Euro 2016.
That would have been an unfair way to be remembered, not only having chalked up over 40 years in management at club and international level but also because Hodgson had done much to restore a sense of meaning and pride to the England job itself.
With much of his earlier managerial career taking place in various locations around the globe, being appointed as England boss on the back of his work with Fulham and West Brom in the Premier League clearly meant so much to him.
Those in the media who follow the national team have spoken warmly both about his respect for their role and for the post that he had assumed in the wake of Fabio Capello's spartan reign.
It was not to be in the major tournaments, although it is only now that Gareth Southgate is experiencing the luxury of having hard choice to make over who to leave out of his squad for the Euros, but Hodgson can justifiably claim to have laid at least some of the foundations for the more successful period that has followed.