Cheeky Chip

Tactics? Teamwork? What Would We Want That For?

By Andy Jones, writing from London

After Sunday’s trouncing at the hands, or feet I should say, of a German team brimming with talent, technique and teamwork, it is not only the current national side that must go back to the drawing board, but every team in the country, ranging from the top clubs in the Premier League to the Sunday league teams for 6 and 7 year olds which start the players’ journeys into becoming professionals.

A number of commentators, pundits and journalists have all touched on the subject that we don’t have a player like Mesut Ozil, we don’t have a classic number 10 who can play in the gap between midfield and defence and seemlessy drift into space, unmarked and unnoticed until the ball is at his feet and he’s already left our defenders in his wake. The reason we don’t have this kind of player is partly down to the way we train our players. While other nations focus from an early age on getting technique and positioning right, our country does not. How many times will you see kids of 12 and 13 being instructed to pass the ball to the best player on their team and hope he beats a couple of men before having a shot or whipping in a cross? And now you’re thinking, “but every good team looks to get the ball to their best player”, but they don’t expect the best player to do all the work, they provide him with options, using those short intricate passes and one-twos to work their way out of the tightest of spaces, even from the edge of their area, what is the English alternative? Hammer the ball up the pitch and hope one of our players latches on to it and can produce something.

We, as a nation, also need to improve our positioning and how we move about the pitch, especially when the other team has the ball. Our boys never pressed enough, they were too slow getting close to the German players and when they did, it was only one person going after them, if you want to win the ball against a player with quick feet and a good passing range, you have to take them on two or three players at a time, crowd them out. Every good team does it and the further up the pitch you do it, take the Spanish for example, if you watch them closely, they try and win it as high up the pitch as possible. Why does England generally wait until they are near the centre circle before putting any real pressure on?

And finally, we must look at our formations, we love our classic four-four-two. It’s the old school formation that most of our players will have grown up using in their early teams, but when you watch the premier league, you will notice almost all the top teams and I don’t just mean the top four, use a much more fluid formation, usually with someone playing in “the hole” just behind the striker and with the wide men being quick pacy wingers who can counter attack in an instant, just like the Germans did. Which also makes me wonder why Capello, who all through qualifiying insisted he wanted speed on the wings and to play with width, decided to leave Walcott at home and only start Lennon twice and then against the Germans replace our only true wide player, Milner, with Joe Cole who cuts in. My final point, regarding the game, was the hilarity of throwing on Emile Heskey when England needed goals, surely Crouch would of been the man to go to, especially with his superb record of coming off the bench and scoring.

It is time now for the FA to take a whole look at the entire structure of the way we train players as a priority, but it will be interesting to see if Capello goes seeing as his future will be decided in two weeks and if Stuart Pearce, who many believe is being groomed to take over from Capello, will be given the job if the Italian does go.