I think I speak for most football fans when I say that we all want our team to play the way that Liverpool did last night against Barcelona. Playing without their star players, they pressed and harassed Barcelona. Liverpool broke up the Catalan’s rhythm of play, never let them build the way that they like, and put in some critical tackles at the right moments to win possession back. When we talk about wanting to see “fight”, about the team “showing heart”, “giving their all”, or “graft” what most fans think of is how Liverpool played last night. For Arsenal supporters (like me) we’ve only seen that one or two times this season.
The stats show that Barcelona actually out-tackled Liverpool (27-23), had more interceptions (15-11), recorded more blocked passes (15-11), and forced Liverpool to turn the ball over more than Liverpool did to them (24-17). Barcelona did all this AND had 53% of the possession! That said, Liverpool did a fantastic job keeping Barcelona well below their season average for shots taken (they normally take 15 shots, they got 8) and that’s a critical stat. One which will be overlooked by some but proves to me that the sheer number of tackles/interceptions/blocks is far less important than the moment that a good defensive move happens.
Graft and heart aside I think it’s fair to say that Liverpool were also a bit lucky. Dembele’s miss in the dying moments at the Nou Camp proved critical, as did two missed big chances – by Luis Suarez and Jordi Alba – in this game. Lionel Messi was kept relatively quiet, though he too had a shot miss just wide and two more saved that he would have scored on another day. All things even, I think Barcelona were slightly unlucky not to score in this game and a single goal would have broken this game for Liverpool.
This isn’t sour grapes! Liverpool were great to watch. And I cannot give them enough credit for playing their hearts out while missing their top players – Salah, Firmino, and Keita were all out with injury. Klopp did a fantastic job setting his team up in such a way that they would maximize each other’s potential, get themselves great chances from a variety of pass types (corners, open play, crosses, through balls) and set them up without the ball in a manner that allowed them to win the ball back and be “first to the ball”. The team played with heart, Klopp played with brain. It was the perfect combination.
I’m not going to win any supporters for saying this* but I think a lot of us Gooners would love to see Arsenal “pull a Liverpool”. By which I mean, be smart in the transfer market, sell high, buy the right players who fit the system, and get in a coach who has a plan so that they could get to the Champions League finals and finish as a title contender in the tightest Premier League season ever.
There are only two problems with this idea: Arsenal can’t be a Liverpool and I’m not even sure that Liverpool are “pulling a Liverpool”. Let’s start with the latter:
Look at the moves Liverpool have made over the last 10 years. It hasn’t all been great since the Fenway Group took over. The early stuff was a real mess and it looked to me like they didn’t much know what they were doing. The year they sold Luis Suarez to Barcelona for an astonishing £75m they spent that money on Lazar, Lallana, and Lovren. They also bought Balotelli, Moreno, Can, Origi, and Rickie Lambert. This is a club that just four years ago put Rickie Lambert on the pitch in order to help them win games. I hope against hope that Arsenal never buy a Lambert, Lallana, Lovren, or Lazar.
And the next year it got worse! They sold Raheem Sterling – who some of their fans said would be a bust – and used that money to buy… Christian Benteke. This was a club that purportedly wanted to be a “moneyball” club but even I knew that Benteke was a bust based just on available data. He’s a ball header. That’s it. In a league where every goal is worth £2m Benteke cost them £42m and scored just 9 goals and got 3 assists.
That was their nadir. After that they have made some astonishingly good moves. Selling Coutinho for £122m is pretty good, but let’s not sleep on the fact that they somehow managed to get Crystal Palace to buy Sakho for £25m that same year. Sakho was their Mustafi. Selling him at all was a coup.
With that £150m in hand, they bought Salah, van Dijk, and Ox. That’s solid business and it looks like they have learned their lesson there – buying goal scorers and goal stoppers. For the last two seasons, Liverpool were able to buy and sell players on a break even basis. And then this summer, Liverpool weren’t all moneyball at all and went out and splashed nearly £150m on Alisson, Keita, Fabinho and Shaqiri.
So, when it comes to “pulling a Liverpool”, I don’t know how much Liverpool are even an example for Liverpool. They did a pretty decent job for two years prior. They duped people into buying some really average players for huge sums and certainly spent that money well on Mane, Firmino, Salah, and van Dijk. But they also spent a lot of money this summer. Maybe they had been sitting on that pile of cash for a few years, they were able to break even the two seasons prior.
The other problem here is that Arsenal don’t have the assets to sell that Liverpool had.
Ozil earns £18m a year (gross) and has £36m left on his two year deal. Mkhitaryan has almost £21m left on his two year deal. Lacazette has three years left on his deal which costs £9m a season and Aubameyang earns the same per season but only has 2 years.
The reason I mention these players’ salaries is that the salary is what’s going to make selling them difficult or impossible. To give some context, Ozil is the 8th highest earner in football. The top earners are (in Pounds, gross, annually):
- Messi – £60.6m (yes, that’s per year)
- Cron7 – £49m
- Griezmann – £39m (yep, per year)
- Neymar – £31m
- Bale – £24m (uh huh, that’s per year)
- Suarez – £20m
- Coutinho – £20m
- Ozil/Alexis – £18m
I see a lot of Arsenal supporters say that we can get 20m for Mkhitaryan or that we should sell Ozil but I think their salaries and age makes that difficult if not downright implausible. If Mkhitaryan went back to Borussia Dortmund, he would be their highest earner over Marco Reus by five thousand pounds per week.
This salary problem isn’t unique to Arsenal. Man U supporters want to “sell Pogba” and Alexis but only the very top clubs could even afford their salaries. Pogba, Alexis, and Ozil earn more salary than everyone in the Bundesliga, all but one guy in Serie A (CRON), everyone in Ligue Un except Neymar, and Pogba would be the 9th highest earner in La Liga while Ozil would be 6th.
So, you can sort of see why moving those top earners is going to be difficult. Now apply that same logic to some of the players that you REALLY want Arsenal to move. Mustafi is “cheap” at just £4.7m per year. At that salary, the only places he could move are Spain – where he would be the 52nd highest paid player – or Serie A which seems to have money somehow. Mustafi only has two years left on his deal, however, so we might be able to pay him to move easier.
There is also some talk that Inter want Xhaka. That’s actually a pretty sensible move. He’s got the exact skill set needed to play in that league and since they play walking football he’s got the pace to match. Like I said above, Serie A also seems to have a ton of money for salary (I can’t figure this one out: empty stadiums, a terrible product, and almost zero global tv reach. Does everyone in Italy just spend all of their money on football?) and Xhaka would be the 6th highest paid player at Inter. We might even be able to recoup some transfer fees on him.
But back to the point about “pulling a Liverpool” Arsenal’s most valuable asset is probably Hector Bellerin. I’ve seen a lot of people say that Arsenal should get £70m for Lacazette but that seems like a HUGE stretch considering his salary of £9m a year and his age. Same for Aubameyang. There is probably some residual value in those two players, I’m not saying they would need to leave on a free, but it’s almost certainly less than £30m.
However, if Arsenal are going to “pull a Liverpool” we would need to do some crazy good business. Liverpool sold Sakho for £25m, maybe we can get someone to take Mustafi for £20? Maybe we can get a club in Italy or Spain to give up £50m+ for Lacazette or Auba?
It feels unlikely at this point with Arsenal. We seem to still be struggling to find our feet in the same way that Liverpool did 9-10 years ago. It also looks to me like we need to build up the value of some players in order to sell them and cover for our own mistakes (pray we never buy a Benteke). And I do think we are going to keep making mistakes in the transfer market for a while.
One final thought. The temptation is to see this and say “this is Wenger’s mess”. Ok, there’s a small amount of truth to that. But Wenger got fired. He’s not here. And Wenger didn’t operate in a vacuum. His decisions were approved by the board, the board also bought some of these players, and the board bought StatsDNA which helped identify some of the biggest duds we’ve seen at Arsenal since Stepanovs.
It’s not like Wenger kept Kroenke in a well in his basement and passed him down a bucket to get the checkbook. If Kroenke was hands off and let Arsene do all this, that’s Kroenke’s fault. Wenger was the guy who took the blame and still takes the blame but this was all approved by Stan, his hand-picked board, and the management team he assembled – which included Wenger. Enos Kroenke has been on the board of directors since 2008 and majority owner since 2011. This is Kroenke’s mess and Enos Kroenke needs to sort it out.
Just to drive the point home: in the 9 years since Fenway Group took over at Liverpool, they built a team that got to the Champions League final by beating Barcelona 4-0. In the 8 years since Kroenke took over Arsenal have dropped out of the top four and are now hoping to win the Europa League to get back into the Champions League.
*Certainly not from Liverpool supporters for my less than generous assessment above that they were lucky. But I don’t know how else to explain that corner, where Barcelona were down 3, just needed to stay in the game, and they all switched off for Origi to score. I guess if I was a Liverpool supporter I might say that they “broke their spirit” or something.
How about we actually make use of the players we have that are so difficult to get rid of? Radical notion, I know.
But we’re not planning to pull a Liverpool. We’re planning to be Spurs. Yes, Spurs. Drastically reduce the wage bill, play as plucky underdogs, in an archaic throwback style. Just the way Underdog Emery likes it.
Our planning is on point. It’s our plan that is the problem.
Why move good players…. our players on the book are coachable to compete ….the system is what faiing us . Work with what is there and make wise additions.
This idea that every player can be coached into playing any system… and yet the system is what failing? isn’t it contradictory?
The system shouldn’t be failing if the players execute it just right.
If only systems drawn up on paper didn’t have to deal with the real world.
Two things got Liverpool players to play out of their skins yesterday: Kop and Klopp. I don’t care for Liverpool but man, I REALLY like their manager, and it seems like his players do to; he clearly is able to motivate them in a way I haven’t seen from Emery. Our players do seem to play for each other, but not so much for the manager… Unai hasn’t helped himself by appearing to be inconsistent, and even vindictive towards some players. And as for our crowd, if ONLY we could get that kind of passion from the smug, spoiled, overpaid, effete intellectuals that inhabit the Emirates. The Totts haven’t won anything in forever, but listen to their crowd. Newcastle, Sunderland, etc. etc. Pretty shameful to hear us booing the team when they most need our support. No wonder they call it “The Library”.
What kind of library do you go to where they boo instead of shush?
I was there when we ALMOST turned around the same deficit against Milan, only for RVP to hit a chipped shot right at the keeper from inside the penalty box. The atmosphere was rocking, and despite not getting through, everyone loved what they had seen.
I was also there when we first beat the Spurs 5-2. Again, despite going 2-0 down, there was a huge roar to get the team going again.
Like any club, there are times when the fans don’t do enough or even harm the team. But give them an occasion, give them good football, and the Emirates really really rocks.
Well, my tongue was hovering in the vicinity of my cheek; I know we can rock the place under the right circumstances. But it seems to me that we are slower than others to get behind the team when things are going poorly, especially during a bad run of games. Maybe other teams have the same problem, but I think our fans’ expectations are sometimes too high (based on too much success in the not-too-distant past?). The irony is that we as fans are the least helpful when the team needs it most. Human nature strikes again.
You’ve made a good point about the quality of support from Arsenal fans vis a vis Spurs. At an estimate I’d say that London has up to a million fans divided between the two clubs, but whereas our fans are from mostly the more wealthy areas across the capitol, Spurs are from the much more working class parts concentrated to their immediate area and to the north east extending into Middlesex & Essex and as such are very, very vocal compared to our relatively subdued self conscious tourists.
I’ve experienced good nights at Highbury & The Emirates, but on the whole The Library slur is well justified.
Just for the record, most of the adjectives from my original post apply to me (not sayin’ which ones). But I’ve never booed the lads, although I’ll admit to shouting some torrid abuse at the telly…
It’s amazing how many Spurs fans there are where I now live (Weston-super-Mare, 150 miles away). If I go to a pub to watch our derby games our fans are outnumbered 10-1, and they’re so aggressive in there support & banter. These are not expat Londoners (like me), but local Somerset men.
Quite a nerving experience sometimes.
I don’t understand how many refuse to see how unfair it is to compare Klopp and Emery on certain time-dependent factors. And to condemn (not even criticize) him on that basis.
FFS!
What Liverpool did manage to do is bring in a manager with a defined vision of what he wanted to do then a) let him clear out the players he didn’t want/need, b) identified very specific players that they wanted/needed and were patient in their pursuit i.e. van Dijk, Keita and c) bought very well from the discount bin i.e. Alexander-Arnold, Wijnaldum, Shaquiri
If I’m correct, hasn’t Liverpool actually posted a record profit this past year? When the owners realized that making the CL final is a big windfall (I think Liverpool made 80m+ from last year’s run) they said OK, go buy Allison.
My fear with our team is that the carry-over from Wenger is the resistance to a complete rebuild of the squad in the manager’s vision, rather we’re just happy to renovate in hopes of getting back into the CL. Maybe making the CL will not be a positive thing because it will stave off the inevitable clear-out that is needed.
This is exactly the point, Jack! I said in the last thread that finishing 3rd would have hurt more than helped in the long run. Two more wins doesn’t change the fact that we are dreadful and need a top-to-bottom renewal. Kroenke would have clearly proclaimed a 3rd place finish a success, and continued the neglect that has gotten us here. Not convinced that 5th place will shock KSE awake, but 3rd would have just encouraged them in their current path of stupidity.
(1) Your analysis does not mention a vibrant youth policy, that is, training a bunch of youth, loan them out, and then sell them to offset buying more expensive players. Chelsea, Liverpool and Southampton are good examples; and Arsenal is a bad example
(2) Right now, I cannot tell Emery’s strategy, thus cannot tell which players he needs to sell coz they don’t fit his strategy.
(3) Defense appears to be Arsenal’s glaring weakness, which requires a different strategy compared to attacking positions
I would add that Liverpool’s win also showed what Arsenal will miss with Ramsey’s departure: 3 of their goals came from late runs by Henderson and Wijnaldum. Ramsey is Arsenal’s only box-to-box player who makes those late runs and has that kind of impact in the final third.
There isn’t a supporter Gooner or otherwise, who wouldn’t want their team to be a bit more like Liverpool today.
Yes, Barca choked but how else would any team comeback from 3-0 deficit without a bit of help from Messi and company? And I would wager on a different result had the return leg been at Camp Nou instead of Anfield.
All credit to the Reds, though. That 2nd half was some of the most enjoyable footy I’ve seen in a while.
a month or so ago, we had a discussion about tim making his bed. from the laundry list of reasons why we argued that he should/shouldn’t make his bed, the one that stands out most is that it makes your room look better. no matter how fancy your furniture, shiny your floors, or beautiful your artwork is, if the bed’s not made, you room is not going to look good. it’s impossible. the bed, by virtue of it’s massive area, is the most important thing to square away.
it’s the same for arsenal. there’s so much talent there that they could cover up the little stuff but not the massive problems. what’s their biggest problem? for me, it’s been at cdm. simply put, since arteta went out injured, arsenal haven’t had a cdm. they’ve papered over the cracks playing the likes of coquelin and cazorla there and while those men did an admirable job, that bed needed making. credit to arsenal, they went out and bought a cdm. discredit to arsenal, they bought xhaka to be their cdm. he’s made the bed look worse. not only is it not made, but it’s turned sideways and the mattress is on the floor.
credit to liverpool. everyone knew they needed a center half and a keeper and they went out and bought those players. no garbage talk about weak mental strength or overpaid players. the club, emphatically, addressed the biggest issues in the market, the manager provided direction, and team’s talent did the rest. btw, that’s a mighty fine liverpool team.
LOVE IT
On point, Tim. Klopp is the secret sauce, in my view. A great coach. Most sides are dead and buried at 3 down, though, as you say, he needed some luck. He will likely finish the season with 97 points, and second place. On that basis, I’d declare Liverpool the People’s Champions over financially doped Manchester City.
The sales of Coutinho and Suarez are what really greased the wheels for Liverpool. If we’d gotten good money for Alexis, Ramsey and even Ozil, no one, not even their fans would be complaining. We got Miki for Alexis, nothing for Ramsey and have all but destroyed Ozil’s value. I agree that Xhaka suits Serie A — I think he’d do pretty well there — but I fear that we we’ll have to shift him for far less than he cost us. Who’s going to take Mustafi? A club where there are no TVs?
Two finals in a row make Liverpool, arguably, Europe’s best Champions League team. But football is funny. They could experience the triple heartbreak of 2 losing finals, and being pipped to the title by City. Or they can dream of an unlikely double. Either way, it’s been a great season for them.
Does anyone remember when Torreira bossed the midfield against Liverpool and totally outplayed Fabinho? And how Liverpool were lucky to escape the Emirates with a point? Happy days, eh?
The English premier league is a hard, tough, long slog. What you’ve absolutely got to be able to do is recover — or you hit a nasty slump like Arsenal did.
That Klopp has built a team for the long distance (EPL) and the big cup (CL) is testament to his greatness as a coach.
“Does anyone remember when Torreira bossed the midfield against Liverpool and totally outplayed Fabinho? And how Liverpool were lucky to escape the Emirates with a point? Happy days, eh?”
No one remembers.
Apparently, we have played huff and puff football all season, with no strategy whatsoever. And whether we somehow win a European trophy and qualify for the UCL this term or not, we’ve had a disaster of a season and Emery has used up his only 1 season chance.
one thing that liverpool has done that i’ve always enjoyed doing is scouring the teams near the bottom of the table for talent. let’s look at what they’ve found:
sadio mane: relegation-threatened southampton
virgil van dijk: relegation-threatened southampton
dejan lovren: relegation-threatened southampton
adam lallana: relegation-threatened southampton
georginio wijnaldum: relegated newcastle
xherdan shaqiri: relegated stoke city
jordan henderson: relegated sunderland
james milner: free from man city
andrew robertson: championship hull city
pardon me if some of these are inaccurate but it’s off the top of my head; i don’t have the time to look it all up.
sure, liverpool have spent a lot of money for players but there’s quality in the premier league at the top of the table and the bottom. you need an eye for talent and the ability to nurture it.
p.s. oxlade-chamberlain is a southampton product as well. liverpool will be playing against dusan tadic who also used to play for southampton.
“Liverpool will be playing against dusan tadic,”
Ugh, spoke too soon. This has been a terrible week.
…makes me wanna throw up.
Something everyone seems to miss is that all these performances where teams pull off such victories, they have had a base of a style that defines them and then they just alter a little off that style while putting their all into the actions that are required by their tactics. It’s one thing to fight, run more and give your all, but it’s also another to fight in the wrong places on the pitch, run to the wrong areas and give your all within an inept system.
These performances have come many times for Arsenal, we just never put the foundation’s over a season to make them definitive of a successful season. We have blitzed Man Utd, Chelsea, Liverpool, Spurs and the rest of the league, other than Man City. But we never really did it within a potentially successful campaign. That always came out of us putting all that effort within Arsene’s style of play.
I wish we could play like that, but in our current guise, we have not done it this season, even though we have put in more effort than anyone in the league this season. I would feel like we could if we were lazy, like last season, but you can’t knock the players for their effort. We are losing games tactically and Liverpool’s win will be remembered for how the players played and fought, but it was more a tactical victory than one of effort. Especially when you use inferior players to the opposition.
one more thing, tim. you can’t compare sahko to mustafi. sahko has always been a good player and a lack of quality isn’t why liverpool sold him. that happened because he had a nasty falling-out with klopp.
Good post Tim. As i said the other day look at the contrast in our two trajectories the past 24 months. A couple of points. The majority of last night’s result was on the manager. We need to find the right manager.
Secondly look at the performances of TAA and Robertson this season. Phenomenal development of cheap young talent. Where is our comparison?
Finally, most of their top players were available to buy and known to us for some time. VVD, Mane, Salah – all players who have been right under our noses for years but we passed on all of them. But so did most of our competitors which brings me to the million dollar question. Isn’t it possible that a good coach gets a better tune out of our current squad?
F*** me. Ajax, man.
That second goal. The cutback, the run onto it from the middle of the park.
I thought of Kolasinac in that moment. What would Saed have done?(besides taling two extra useless touches and hitting it against the defender)
Intensity, energy, confidence, athleticism. Theyre the real deal.
Looks to me Ajax are not just giant killers. They can also take care of business when it comes to handling teams like Tottenham.
I think I spoke too soon and jinxed them. FAACK
A team in red and white playing free flowing football. How things should be.
They literally turned into Arsenal ffs
Might have to stop following football if Tottenham win the UCL.
Is it not too much to ask that, if we are going to play like shite, at least the scum should play like the scum of old?
I’m just gonna go drink some cider in the park…
Mickeys and Scum in the CL final. Excuse me while I make my way to the park…to drink some cider.
FFS.
Wenger left and it all fell apart. Everything!
It fell apart under Wenger, too. You never remember that.
I like how stoic you are about this.
Lol
Spuds in the CL final and bloody Emery sold them Lucas Moura. If that isn’t a sign that Emery won’t work out for us then the football gods have a sick sense of humour.
This is a black swan event. You can’t prepare for this sh8.
The sky is falling when not even S&#rs spursed it up and left it to their opponents.
We absolutely must see it out tomorrow and get to that Europa final.
The only way to make sure we don’t buy duds is to have scouts, an analysis dept and a DOF who have a singular vision and who can marry stats analysis and the good old eye test.
The players identified must then be able to play in the manager’s style of play and have at least one of the physical traits that are needed to thrive in the league (height, speed, endurance and strength or technical ability to overcome those deficiencies).
I feel like we are on the wrong path already because I don’t think Emery has a clear style and the players that we got in don’t have a standout physical trait or technical ability. Leno isn’t a good passer and is average height for a GK, Guenduzi is lightweight and Torreira is just too short and slight. All these players haven’t improved the 1st team imo.
We’ve lost a top recruitment guy due to internal power struggles and have yet to appoint a DoF so we’ve effectively lost a year.
From now on we also need to look at lower leagues (ie Brooks), academy players not being given a chance elsewhere (ie Sancho) and relegated teams (ie Roberton). How we didn’t spot Brooks and pounce on Sancho is beyond me. For many years we’ve been stripped of talent and we should do the same.
Your assessments of guendouzi and torreira are nonsense. One thing we can clearly learn from other sports and arsenal should surely be applying from the nba is that players at their age should be expected to improve their physicality.
Maybe we call pull a Spuds instead…
I felt Pocchetino out there at the end, man. He’s had a crap fortnight, and only Arsenal’s utter abjectness and incompetence stopped their freefall out of the Top 4. An away goal at home gave them a mountain to climb. All without the best all round striker in the premier league.
Yeah go ahead and lynch me, fellow gooners. The worst I can feel towards Spurs in jealousy, not an ounce of animus. They deserved that, and Poch deserved his emotinal release.
Because football, because sport at its pulsating best.
All that said, I’ll be rooting for Liverpool. But I would not be at all surprised if Spurs rose to the occasion.
We dont like power shift talk, but the unpalatable truth is that the portents point to one.
Spurs will win the CL. I called it at the R16. I will not be following football for a while. We suck. They don’t. It all sucks.
Yes you did
Valencia be like “you want a comeback? Hold my beer”
Sangria 🙂
Liverpool playing beautiful football. Spurs in the CL final. I am going to be sick.
I have been in a funk with football into the past two seasons. I kept following Arsenal out of habit and I don’t know if it’s because life is getting harder but I feel less passionate about Arsenal and football in general.
Then I watched Liverpool make an exhilarating comeback. I realised two things. There is no way Arsenal would have been able to do that, and it’s not that I’ve fallen out of love with football, it’s because Arsenal just isn’t the same club I fell in love with.
I think I’ll need a separation from football for a while.*
* I say that only to probably naively get my hopes up next season.
Before the kick in the teeth of the Spurs winner, watching the CL semis had me thinking how difficult it is to play this game. The level of technical ability on display over the 4 games has been unreal. Even so, under pressure and a well coordinated, energetic press, all the technique in the world can still fall apart.
We took it for granted for many years how good we were technically. We’re nowhere near bad but need to up our game. I agree completely with joshuad that we need to prioritise a quality cdm. Even if it means exhausting all our budget and filling the rest of the squad out with kids and loans, I would do it. Need that control in midfield.
This is an Arsenal blog and, therefore, it makes sense that the comments are Arsenal-centric. But I suggest we forget about rivalries. Those two games were just amazing and those two English teams did a fantastic job. The football was incredible, the drama, the suspense, the courage fantastic.
Football got so much better (at the top level). We probably don’t realize as it unfolds under our eyes, week after week. It’s like a kid growing and you need the visit of the aunt living in Australia to tell you. I’m sure that any team of only 10 years ago would be easily beaten by the best teams of 2019. The athleticism, the play without ball, the comfort the players show under pressure, the speed of movements, the accuracy of the passes, the ball control…
Johan Cruyff is at the basis of all this. He started with all the current concepts like ball possession, control, high press, getting the ball back in 6 seconds, high wingers, technical abilities for defenders, verticality… He was a genius. He made Ajax, he made Barcelona, he made Pep, and it flourishes.
Another thing: those two English teams won because of brilliant coaches, a good helping of luck, a brilliant mentality but also, and maybe above all, because they play in the premier league, there where the football is the fastest and the harshest. They dominated physically and mentally. They were ready for a fight because they fight every week.
Last point: the Trent corner! What a moment of guile, inspiration, ingenuity! What a quick brain. He was going to let Shaqiri do it, glanced at the pitch, saw the potential of the situation in a fraction of a second, he had the balls to change his mind and rush a kick. And they are in the final. 20 years old. Respect!!!
In an interview, Klopp said he wants players who can think, who can find solutions, solve problems. It’s what Trent did. And the opposite of what we have with Mustafi and Xhaka.
Tim, or anyone else.
What would be the stats you would look for in your search for a good cdm?
my man, you can not do that! this is one position where stats lie.
i remember a report where stats suggested borussia mönchengladbach midfielder, granit xhaka, was very similar to fc bayern midfielder, xabi alonso. they had similar stature, long ball accuracy, high pass completion percentage, free kicks, and xhaka had a reputation as a bit of a bad boy; he used to like to tackle, often making illegal tackles resulting in multiple cautions and sendings off. the report was legit. statistically, xhaka was the young xabi alonso. however, that is where the similarities stop.
the difference between xhaka and xabi alonso is, as a youth player, xabi alonso, was taught how important situational awareness and speed of thought were; something he learned playing along side his childhood friend, mikel arteta. if xhaka had that situational awareness, he’d truly be the new xabi alonso. however, he doesn’t, so he’s not the new xabi alonso. there’s no stat for speed of thought or situational awareness.
I know their limitation. What I’m looking to understand is if there’s a set of stats that could point in the right direction, to then do the more traditional scouting.
Something which statistically pops out with all great DMs even if it also leads to false positives, like in the case of Xhaka.
You’re thinking about it wrong. Stats don’t *replace* the eye test, you have to use them in conjunction. Stats narrow down the field of hundreds of midfielders to a small selection worthy of extensive tape review and/or in person watching. Stats get you to “Xhaka or Fabiano or Keita or dudes x, y, and z” and then the intense scouting starts (and if the scouts notice somebody else while watching those guys they go back to the analysts and say “hey, run the numbers on so and so too”).
I write about this every year. Long ball completion rates are one of my top metrics, turnover rates are another. They show talent, skill. What I’ve learned over the years is that tackles are pretty unimportant. For the most part what Opta counts as a tackle requires a dribble and they don’t split out standing tackles versus dribble-duels. So, if you’re the kind of player who is rarely dribbled at, you won’t have high tackles numbers. Conversely, if you on’t try to win the ball back, the other guy doesn’t get a dribble. So, I combine tackles, blocks, and interceptions into one metric called “BITs”. This measures how often a players is winning the ball back/stopping an attack with a defensive action.
So, the top players for this metric are once again Gueye, Kante, and Ndidi. Sol Bamba makes a surprise appaearance there and Chambers was a bit of a surprise last year.
Oh yes of course, the BIT stat.. Love that explanation too. How does pass % come into play, if at all.
Thanks!
Chambers for DM!!
You have the basic stats like tackles, interceptions, blocks, recoveries, turnovers. But then you need to complement those stats with the eye test or traditional scouting: reading of the game, sensing danger, positional play. There’s also a reason why Pep prefers a Fernandinho to a Gueye. Fernandinho can contribute offensively: his technique and his reading of the game are so good that he can make the assist to the assist or even deliver the final ball. Passing accuracy can be misleading because it doesn’t measure the impact in the final third.
Last point: the Trent corner! What a moment of guile, inspiration, ingenuity! What a quick brain. He was going to let Shaqiri do it, glanced at the pitch, saw the potential of the situation in a fraction of a second, he had the balls to change his mind and rush a kick. And they are in the final. 20 years old. Respect!!!
I watched the goal (in real time), watched replays several times, and it gets better every time. TAA had to rush that corner , had to hope DO saw it (else he would have looked stupid) and had to make sure he placed it a a penny for DO. He saw all this in microseconds. You surmised it brilliantly, Serge. Your words however made me sad. Why? Ozil. TAA displayed Ozilesque vision. – when Ozil is ticking. Or is that the Ozil of yore? From a 19 yr old!