The French professor..introducing new training techniques to bring Arsenal back from the brink?
Some thoughts from Arsenal observer Rob Kirby ahead of their pivotal Champions League playoff match against Udinese later today:
Apparently, the last chance saloon is in Udine, Italy. I always wondered as to the exact location. Despite the fact that it would have scuppered the Man City deal, if Nasri played today it would have made sense both financially and sporting-wise. Arsenal will lose £20 million minimum (some say £25m) in TV revenue if they fail to qualify for the CL. Assuming the Nasri deal is £25m, that justifies hanging onto Nasri to my mind, since we seem to be incapable of finding anyone to replace him, anyway. Any hopes of attracting someone of Eden Hazard’s calibre hinges on playing in the European top flight. But all this assumes Nasri’s heart would be in it, and that is debatable. If we lose, according to CL rules, he wouldn’t be cup-tied, so no harm in having him on the bench. But at this point it’s water under the bridge, or water that passed beneath the bridge weeks ago.
Arsenal are like lepers currently. Prospective targets keep rejecting offers, right and left. That will change if the Udinese match goes North London’s direction, but it still leaves little or no time for squad reinforcements. Fortunately, all the teens did well against Liverpool, despite the loss. Fans seem to have cottoned to Frimpong’s energy instantly, red card notwithstanding. And though the Ramsey-Ignasi own goal combo was regrettably unlucky, I don’t think anyone would have preferred to see Squillaci in the young Spanish defender’s place. They got thrown in the deep end, but stayed afloat. It’s the senior players who dropped the ball. And there never should have been 3 teenage EPL debuts in such an important game, with a fourth coming on as a sub.
I will always be optimistic about Arsenal and Arsene’s abilities, but it’s getting tougher. Arsenal have now racked up 3 suspensions (almost 4, with Wenger awaiting the UEFA verdict) and until yesterday 6 injuries (Wilshere, Koscielny, Gibbs, Djourou, Rosický, Diaby, Traoré). Djourou, Rosický and Traoré have been deemed fit to travel, but they’ve got to be feeling on the iffy side of fitness. At least Gervinho and Song can play this week and have been rested.
But as demoralizing as it is, if Arsenal win, it could change the trajectory of the entire season. Much hangs in the balance tonight. There aren’t enough fingers to cross.
[Editors’ note: We welcome backAdam Novy for a preview of this Saturday’s little match in London–Manchester United versus FC Barcelona, meeting at Wembley for the 2011 UEFA Champions League final.]
Suicidal tendencies?
Manchester United is a cunning team who play a vintage 4-4-2 formation and, when focused, do well controlling games against big teams, as with their three recent wins against Chelsea, a side who always used to kill them. While Barcelona my be slightly overrated by a droolingly uncritical press who’ve made them poster kids for liberal self-congratulation despite their racist players, they play the best and most attractive football of any club in memory, and have five or six of the best position players in the world, including Leo Messi, who’s in a class by himself. To beat Barcelona, Utd will need a number of things to go their way, and, if any single one of them doesn’t, they will lose. (You should probably be told, gentle reader, that I’m a Man Utd fan.) It’s not impossible for Utd to pull this off, but it’s highly unlikely.
Here is a list of things Utd need to do to win:
Squeeze Out Service To Messi
Lionel Messi is almost impossible to stop, except when he plays for Argentina, when he never gets the ball in dangerous places and has almost no influence at all. Germany contained him without sweating, and, to do the same, Utd will need to keep the ball from getting to him in the box. Because he moves back and forth and side-to-side, Utd will cede possession if he’s far from the goal, but try to angle him away if he’s in the area. Also, once he gets the ball, he’ll need to be smothered. He cannot be allowed to pass to open teammates.
Chelsea travel to Manchester today to play in the only quarterfinal match that remains winnable by either side. The Londoners head into Old Trafford a goal down and perhaps lacking the confidence to steal it back. It doesn’t help matters that their floppy-haired central defender David Luiz is cup-tied and cannot play, nor that the £50M man up front can’t seem to find the back of the net.
United are, well, United. They persevere. Even without key components of their team for long periods this season (Valencia, misfiring Rooney, Ferdinand) they’ve managed to reach the FA Cup semifinal, the quarters of the Champions League, and are sitting 8 points clear at the top of the Prem. Chelsea, who are usually bigger and faster than the teams they come up against, weren’t able to convert their extra inches into goals, and looked a little slow in attack during the first leg.
Speed to goal isn’t something United lack. They have one of the swiftest counter attacks in all of football, with the little pumpkin churning away up front, and Nani and Valencia flying up the wings. More importantly, they have absolute belief in themselves, and it shows in the way they move the ball and force the attack. Chelsea were often hesitant in the first leg, pulling the ball sideways when a more direct attack may have been available, and giving the United defense enough time to readjust. Yes there was the Ramirez challenge that should’ve been a penalty, but you can’t rest all your hopes of winning on a spot kick.
The key to Chelsea victory will be exploiting O’Shea in right back. He’s just coming back from a hamstring injury, and it will be up to Malouda and Cole to make his day difficult (if they can also manage Valencia). We’ll come back at’cha with post-game analysis, but for now here are a few tidbits that will probably have no impact on proceedings:
Only twice in the UEFA Champions League era – Inter Milan’s triumph at Bayern Munich in this season’s last-16 (0-1 home, 3-2 away) and the 1995/96 semi-finals, when Ajax recovered from losing 1-0 at home to Panathinaikos with a 3-0 away triumph – has a team turned round a tie after a home first-leg defeat.
United have progressed in all 13 UEFA competition ties where they won the first game away from home, most recently against AC Milan in last season’s round of 16 (3-2 away, 4-0 home). That includes only one 1-0 away win, at Lille in the 2006/07 round of 16, which preceded another 1-0 victory at Old Trafford.
Chelsea’s quarter-final record in the competition is five wins and one defeat. United have won 11 and lost five at this stage, and went down on away goals to Bayern Munich 12 months ago.
This fantastic video was making the rounds of the footy interwebs last week–animator Richard Swarbrick (@RikkiLeaks) with an dreamlike impressionistic rendering of Gareth Bale’s Champions League performances vs Inter Milan:
This blew up especially after it was listed at #1 among “Our Favourite Things This Week” by Guardian Football–they specifically linked to the Run of Play’s post of it, titled “Bones Like Ghost” (“If there were a channel that showed live matches in this style, I might forget what living people looked like”).
For those of you that somehow haven’t seen the “IRL” version of Bale v Inter, see here. Though that video clip, like most of the hundreds of soccer highlight videos on YouTube, has a jarring soundtrack–which is a regrettable phenomenon that Run of Play addressed in an earlier post: “On Soundtracks“:
It’s a universal in football that the only people who take the time to find every single Dennis Bergkamp goal on film and then edit them together into an attractive looking YouTube-length clip listen to either emocore, pop schlock, or trance/house music.
Finally, whenever we revisit Bale v Inter, we’re reminded of Gazzetta dello Sport’s line–still the best of 2010 by our estimation. Translated from the Italian by the Daily Mail: “‘He is devastating. How else can you describe him ? He doesn’t have one extra gear but three. This time he didn’t score but he assisted. He is a force of nature.”
"L'Inter crolla col Tottenham. Bale scatenato. Benitez: "Troppo veloci"
Olympique Marseille visits Old Trafford today, attempting to advance to the final eight of the Champions League for the first time since 1993--when they went all the way and won the title--the one and only time a French club has won the Champions League. Marseille held Manchester United to a scoreless draw at home in the Stade Velodrome in the first leg--and hence Man U needs an outright victory in today's match to advance. Look for Marseille to sit back and play a disciplined defensive game--and attempt to score at least one goal via a counterattack.
The first leg of Arsenal-Barcelona did not disappoint, with the Gunners stunningly coming from behind to win 2-1 three weeks ago at home in London. So the return leg today in Barcelona is even more tantalizing.
As Fabregas indicated in his first leg post-match interview, one should think of these home&away aggregate-goal fixtures as a single 180 minute match. So Arsenal lead 2-1 at “half”; do they come out and try to defend that lead for 90 minutes on the road? That is to say, will they attempt to park the proverbial bus? Many believe Wenger is philosophically incapable of doing so, and he has said this week that Arsenal won’t do so–which perhaps mean they will? It will be interesting to see the starting XIs Wenger and Guardiola will choose, the formations they deploy, and how they instruct their sides to play.
Both teams will be missing key players due to injury or suspension, requiring both managers to start players that haven’t done so most of the season. Barcelona will be without both Pique and Puyol–the solid central back partnership for not only club but also World Cup-winning country. So Barça will have a very different look in the back, which will most likely ripple into midfield. Indications are that Guardiola will move Busquets back from his usual defensive midfield position to partner with Abidal in the center of the defense, and Mascherano will get the start in the holding midfield role.
Beyond that, Barcelona’s lineup should be consist of the usual suspects, arrayed in their usual 4-3-3: the Brazilian wingbacks (Dani Alves and either Maxwell or Adriano) on either side of the center backs; Xavi and Iniesta in the heart of the midfield; Messi, Villa, and Pedro providing the attack.
Though as tactical guru Jonathan Wilson described in a column last fall, it’s not unusual that both of Barca’s wingbacks go forward to provide width in attack–especially against sides that are sitting deep in a firmly parked bus–in which cases Busquets would drop back to stay home and keep Pique/Puyol company (and hence the 4-3-3 would morph to something more like a W-W, i.e.. a 2-3-2-3).
Two points to take away from that. One: central defense is not such a foreign place for Busquets. Two, watch for if/when the wingbacks get far forward, to see if Arsenal can regain possession and counterattack into that space. That’s what Arsenal was able to do at the Emirates–most memorably on the beautiful winning goal, when Fabregas picked out Nasri behind the defense on the right wing, and Nasri waited for Arshavin to come up into the box up the right wing (running past a casually jogging Dani Alves). But it also happened in the first half, when Fabregas and Walcott got behind the defense on two separate occasions.
Indeed, Arsenal could use Walcott on the pitch tomorrow, as his speed is something Barcelona is has worried about in previous matches. Unfortunately for the Gunners, he’s out due to injury, so it will fall to Nasri, Arshavin and most likely Bendnter to make those breaks forward, with Fabregas and Wilshere feeding them from the central midfield. (Recall that in the 2nd leg of last year’s quarterfinals at the Nou Camp, Bendnter scored to put Arsenal up in the match and on aggregate–but shortly thereafter the Messi show started.) Even though Robin van Persie was a late surprise inclusion in the squad, look for him to start on the bench and come on if Arsenal find themselves down.
The battle to watch is in midfield. Arsenal is significantly without their defensive midfield stalwart Alex Song. We expect it will be Abou Diaby to start alongside young Jack Wilshere as the two in Arsenal’s 4-2-3-1 (although Zonal Marking makes a case in his match preview that Wenger might go with Denilson). If you can, simultaneously track Xavi, Iniesta, and Messi when Barcelona have possession (which should of course be most of the time), and watch for who out of Barcelona’s midfield is able to track that trinity, tackle to regain possession–and potentially start counterattacks.
The marquee matchup of the Round of 16 is without a doubt Arsenal vs. Barcelona. That’s partly because Arsenal is the one group-stage favorite that slipped into 2nd place in their group (behind Shakhtar Donetsk, due to losses at Donetsk and at Sporting Braga), and hence had to draw a group winner for the Round of 16. But it’s also because these teams have an affinity, a rivalry, and a history.
Their rivalry comes out of their affinity and their history. Both play what might be called the Dutch style of football–one that emphasizes possession, with the ball on the ground, intricate and sustained buildup (the opposite of “Route one” football), one- and two-touch passing (tiki-taka, if you will), individual technical skill, movement off the ball, a fearful geometry of passing angles..all in all, various aspects of “total” football.
Indeed, this Dutch heritage is real, especially in Barcelona’s case: their spiritual leader is Johan Cryuff, who brought to Barcelona this style–or rather philosophy–from Ajax in the early ’70s, when he was the best player in the world. It was Cryuff who suggested that Barcelona set up a youth academy, similar to the Ajax Academy, which became the famous La Masia–“The House that Built Barca” (h/t to Sumit for the link).
Cryuff & Guardiola: Yoda & the Then-young Jedi
And Cryuff returned to Barcelona in the early ’90s, managing a group of fantastic players called Cryuff’s Dream Team–the “fulcrum” of which was a young midfielder named Pep Guardiola. Now of course Guardiola is manager–and some are saying Guardiola’s current team is better than those Barcelona teams; including some who played alongside Pep back then (“when they won the European Cup for the first time in 1992 and clinched four consecutive league titles between 1991 and 1994. That side featured the likes of Romario, Hristo Stoichkov and Ronald Koeman.)
Cryuff now dispenses his opinions and wisdom with weekly essays that appear in the Barcelona newspaper El Periódico. One of his recent entries was titled “El fútbol total del siglo XXI“–“Total Football for the 21st Century” (“Solo dos equipos, el Madrid de Di Stéfano y el Ajax de los años 70, habían sido capaces hasta ahora de reinventar el fútbol como lo está haciendo el de Guardiola” which translates to: “Only two teams, the Madrid of de Di Stefano and the Ajax of the early ’70s were able to reinvent the game as Guardiola’s team is now doing.”
With Arsenal, a similar “continental” style of play came to north London via France–Arsene Wenger arrived to manage Arsenal in the mid-’90s, after a decade managing in France. Although he’s perhaps best known for bringing to the Premier League French and African (and especially, perhaps, French-African), two of his most influential players in his first decade coaching at Arsenal were Dutch internationals Denis Bergkamps and Marc Overmars–and one of his most important right now is Dutch striker Robin van Persie.
But his most important player, Arsenal’s talisman, if you will, is Cesc Fabregas–a native Catalan whom Wenger signed away from Barcelona’s La Masia seven years ago, when Cesc was only 16. Apparently Cesc was convinced that he wouldn’t have the same opportunities to play at Barcelona that he has had at Arsenal, given the midfield talent that was being groomed at La Masia back then. But now Barcelona now wants to bring Fabregas back–which is one source of conflict between the clubs, and one of the major storylines of these meetings.
As a player, Guardiola was very much the prototype of the modern Spanish midfielder: technically-gifted, balanced and an immaculate passer of the ball.
He was at the heart of Johan Cruyff’s all-conquering Barca side in the 1990s and was idolised by the young Fabregas as he made his way through the academy ranks.
Borrell, who has remained a friend and confidante to Fabregas, tells a story that encapsulates the connection between the Arsenal star and his one-time hero.
In 2001, when Fabregas was going through the pain of his parents’ divorce, Borrell persuaded Guardiola to sign his famous number four shirt for the young protege. On it, he wrote: ‘One day, you will be the number four of Barcelona.’
Guardiola & Xavi
But for now, of course, the heart of the Barcelona midfield, the deus ex machina, is Xavi. Messi scores the goals, gets the press, gets the awards–but many thought it was Xavi that should have received the Balon d’Or this year, instead of Messi (but Xavi finished 3rd in the balloting–with Iniesta finishing 2nd!).
You must read this interview with Xavi that Guardian Football’s Spanish correspondent Sid Lowe conducted last weekend. An excerpt:
Think quickly, look for spaces. That’s what I do: look for spaces. All day. I’m always looking. All day, all day. [Xavi starts gesturing as if he is looking around, swinging his head]. Here? No. There? No. People who haven’t played don’t always realise how hard that is. Space, space, space. It’s like being on the PlayStation. I think shit, the defender’s here, play it there. I see the space and pass. That’s what I do.
That’s at the heart of the Barcelona model and runs all the way through the club, doesn’t it? When you beat Madrid, eight of the starting XI were youth-team products and all three finalists in this year’s Ballon d’Or were too – Lionel Messi, Andrés Iniesta and you.
Some youth academies worry about winning, we worry about education. You see a kid who lifts his head up, who plays the pass first time, pum, and you think, ‘Yep, he’ll do.’ Bring him in, coach him. Our model was imposed by [Johan] Cruyff; it’s an Ajax model. It’s all about rondos [piggy in the middle]. Rondo, rondo, rondo. Every. Single. Day. It’s the best exercise there is. You learn responsibility and not to lose the ball. If you lose the ball, you go in the middle. Pum-pum-pum-pum, always one touch. If you go in the middle, it’s humiliating, the rest applaud and laugh at you.
Your Barcelona team-mate Dani Alves said that you don’t play to the run, you make the run by obliging team-mates to move into certain areas. “Xavi,” he said, “plays in the future.”
They make it easy. My football is passing but, wow, if I have Dani, Iniesta, Pedro, [David] Villa … there are so many options. Sometimes, I even think to myself: man, so-and-so is going to get annoyed because I’ve played three passes and haven’t given him the ball yet. I’d better give the next one to Dani because he’s gone up the wing three times. When Leo [Messi] doesn’t get involved, it’s like he gets annoyed … and the next pass is for him.
See below for what Xavi has to say about Arsenal and English football. (With apologies to Sid Lowe and the Guardian, we’ve ended up excerpting the majority of the interview–so click thru and give them a pageview. Or even better, make sure you read everything Sid Lowe writes–no better English-language coverage of La Liga exists, as far as we can tell. In fact, click thru to Lowe’s breakdown of “Three lessons for Arsenal before they take on Barcelona“; namely–1: Internazionale, Champions League, 20 Apr 2010; 2: Sporting Gijón, La Liga 12 Feb 2010; 3: Real Madrid, La Liga 29 Nov 2010.)
Firstly, from the Xavi interview, speaking about Spain, but easily parallels Barça:
“Paraguay? What did they do? Built a spectacularly good defensive system and waited for chances – from dead balls. Up it goes, rebound, loose ball. It’s harder than people realise when you’ve got a guy behind you who’s two metres tall and right on top of you.”
I think we all know that Arsenal totally incapable of playing like Paraguay. Also from Xavi: “But now I see Arsenal and Villarreal and they play like us.” That said, certainly Wilshere’s remarks about “getting nasty” indicate a plan, though Xavi suggests an alternate route, “Yes, but this year they’re much better. I think it’s a disadvantage for us that we played last year. They had [too] much respect for us. It was as if they let us have the ball.” So keeping the ball, Arsenal’s preferred routine in Engerland, would do them better according to one of their opponent’s key players.
Realistically, of course, given Nasri’s injury especially, we know both Song and Wilshere will play. In fact, there is little reason to suspect a different line-up than the one that played against Wolves on Saturday (which was, including substitutions: Wojciech Szczesny, Bacary Sagna, Laurent Koscielny, Johan Djourou, Gael Clichy, Cesc Fabregas, Theo Walcott, Alexandre Song, Jack Wilshere (Pereira Neves Denilson, 77), Andrey Arshavin (Marouane Chamakh, 72), Robin van Persie (Nicklas Bendtner, 72)).
Koscielny and Djourou will have their hands full with Pedro and Villa, but the Gunners must rely on those two as Song, Wilshere, and even Fabregas must neutralize the trinity of Xavi, Iniesta, and Messi. Clichy, of course, must await Alves at his front. Arsenal should consider assigning Wilshere to Messi always and everywhere. Now if Pique decides to get in the mix from the back, van Persie will struggle to help, but at least that places the ball much farther back in the formation. Little will matter if Arsenal’s third-string keeper can’t handle free kicks.
Barça’s shape does provide some opportunity. Sagna must take every chance to get forward and exploit the absence of a true winger on that side. Naturally, this will help push Arshavin forward to provide a link and partner to RvP. What, isn’t that Walcott’s side? Well, certainly, the two have switched flanks, allowing Walcott all the room Alves has vacated, particularly if Wilshere and Song can lay some longer diagonals in front of him.
Should be an interesting match despite every commentator essentially writing off Arsenal since the draw.
Chelsea travel to Manchester today to play in the only quarterfinal match that remains winnable by either side. The Londoners head into Old Trafford a goal down and perhaps lacking the confidence to steal it back. It doesn’t help matters that their floppy-haired central defender David Luiz is cup-tied and cannot play, nor that the £50M man up front can’t seem to find the back of the net.
