Cheerio & Thanks!

That’s all from World Cup College! We would like to thank our loyal readership – and pass on special thanks to those who have left regular comments. It’s been a lot of fun keeping the site going over the past few months. We hope you’ve enjoyed it too. We were also very pleased to be considered one of the best World Cup websites by respected football magazine When Saturday Comes.
 
WCC has been running in earnest since early January and in total we have posted more than 200 football-related articles. Most of these have featured in the College’s main faculties: Arts and Law, Life Sciences, Physical Sciences, and Social Sciences. If we needed any light relief, the Student Union was always open where we could grab a cheap lager whilst shaking our heads indignantly at the antics of Wing-back’s Ashley Le Sansom.
 
We followed England through their successful qualification campaign for South Africa, and accordingly believed that a reasonably successful World Cup 2010 lay ahead. This hope should perhaps have been tempered by plentiful historical evidence which suggests that England aren’t a member of the world’s footballing elite. But it was an enjoyable tournament overall: Spain were worthy winners and it’s nice to have a new name on the cup. WCC’s favourite team of the tournament were semi-finalists Germany who gave England a hard time in the Round of 16. WCC predicts that Germany will be the first European team to win a World Cup in South America at Brazil 2014.
 
The site will stay online as the definitive academic guide to World Cup 2010 – cheerio!

Thomas Hobbes & English Mechanism

WCC has noted previously that the England team appears to operate somewhat mechanistically. Even over a successful qualification campaign it seemed that Fabio Capello’s efforts had yielded mechanical rather than organic solidarity. The team was playing well together, but like an ordered collection of components rather than a smooth functioning whole. This reflects English society to a degree: this nation is closely defined by the temporal framework of a 9 to 5, Monday to Friday culture. Collectivist solutions to social problems such as the Welfare State, which were predominantly put into place in the immediate post-war era, also have something of an overarching mechanistic quality.

The philosophical principle mechanism is based on the notion that living entities are essentially machines. Thomas Hobbes provided a famous exposition of mechanism in his work Leviathan: he stated that society or the state was like an artificial man. Humans are a work of nature who comprise an artificial collective which requires the control of a powerful sovereign source. The parts of the machine may interrelate, but an external agent prescribes the ordering and nature of this relationship. This contrasts with organicism which states that social forms are best understood as organic wholes. Macro phenomena are not reducible to the parts which make up the whole. Emergent properties arise via complex interrelationships within and between different levels of the social body. Order is therefore emergent rather than imposed by an external entity.

The mechanism which animates life in England has changed however, and the parts have become increasingly fragmented. Neo-liberalism has been the key political philosophy since the 1980s and this requires a footloose and individualized workforce. One of the aims of neo-liberalism is to free people from the restraints of unresponsive and unwieldy state systems. The problem with this approach is that legitimate authority becomes eroded as an atomised consumption-oriented populace comes to view personal material gain as its sovereign guiding principal.

There is accordingly some uncertainty with regard to the best way to prompt cohesion and functionality from the England team. England aren’t flexible or talented enough to comprise an organic whole, but neither are they team-oriented enough to diligently serve a more mechanistic team ethic. During the Sven Goran Eriksson years, a ‘neo-liberal’ laissez-faire approach seemed to be adopted, with the focus on fielding the best players with the hope that they work the system out between themselves. But the team usually operated as a disjointed collection of components, rather than empowered free spirits. For World Cup 2010 it was decided that a more Leviathan-like approach under Capello was required: it was hoped that authority could wring the machine’s parts into some sort of working order. However, whereas managers such as Eriksson (and Steve McClaren) were viewed as too weak, Capello has been viewed as too autocratic. If the players are referred to as ‘JT’ and ‘Stevie G’, then the coach is an insufficient sovereign authority. But stop them from having a beer and you’re denying them fundamental human rights!

Germany were traditionally viewed as a machine-like, efficient team but have evolved into a more organic unit with fast and flexible attacking players in the side. In contrast Capello’s England looked very laboured at World Cup 2010, as the coach tried to prompt a semblance of coordination from his collection of individuals. Capello imposed enough mechanistic order for England to bulldoze lesser opposition in the qualifiers. But under tournament pressure, and presented with superior rivals, the machine faltered like an overused VHS recorder. It could take some time for England’s football ethos to meet the requirements of the international game. Until it does, the best we can hope for is a machine that can make it to the quarter-finals of major tournaments – before it is then outmanoeuvred and outwitted by more organic entities.

The W-W formation: the future?!

It is hard to envisage how formations will evolve in response to the current formational hegemony 4-2-3-1. It is an adaptable format which matches up well against other approaches. Two defensive midfielders provide a shield for the back four, which allows the full-backs to advance. The attacking midfielder has the freedom in behind the centre-forward to influence forward play without being mired in the opposition’s central defence – and they also prevent the team from being outnumbered in midfield. Up against 4-4-2, the 4-2-3-1 has an extra central-midfielder so can enable a side to overrun the opposition. The 4-2-3-1 is also fairly immune to sides switching to a 3-5-2 or one of its variants. The two wide-midfielders can force the wing-backs to retreat preventing the opposition from generating any attacking width – whilst a three-man central-defence would also be over-resourced against one orthodox centre-forward. This contrasts with England’s 4-4-2, which was unable to overcome Algeria’s 3-4-2-1 in the group stage.

It’s therefore 4-2-3-1 which is the most robust contemporary on-pitch arrangement. The key variation to this configuration is perhaps lateral rather than longitudinal. For example, champions Spain play quite a narrow formation with Iniesta and Pedro taking up quite central roles next to Xavi. This allows Spain to control central-midfield and much of the attacking width is provided by the full-backs. The narrow 4-2-3-1 (also deployed by Brazil) is just a tweak away from 4-2-2-2. The potential difficulty with this approach is that the full-backs could be held back by opposition wingers and therefore width is lost. But the 4-2-3-1 should have sufficient flexibility for the wider midfielders to take up positions closer to the touchline. Spain actually addressed this matter in the final by bringing on Jesus Navas and deploying him at right-wing. Up until this point Holland left-back Giovanni van Bronckhorst (without a wide-midfielder to mark) was able to push up more into a defensive midfield position to limit Spain’s attacking space.

Formational oscillations in future will continue to be based upon a team trying to use the space of the pitch to best effect, in particular controlling central areas whilst retaining attacking width. Could the narrow 4-2-3-1 see the full-back role changing in response? Without a wide-midfielder to mark, the full-back could take up a more central role, akin to a holding midfielder. As WCC has noted, full-backs tend to be more advanced than their central-defensive counterparts, and in terms of average positioning over a game could be considered wide-defensive-midfielders. The step inside to a more central-defensive-midfield role is thus not particularly radical.

Under the 2-3-2-3 or W-W formation [white shirts, pictured] two central-defenders would still be in place to marshall one centre-forward, and the two (former) full-backs would join a central defensive-midfielder. (This shape is reminiscent of the metodo created in the 1930s by then Italian coach Vittorio Pozzo.) One possible shortcoming of the 4-2-3-1 is that the attacking midfielder can be shut-out by two defensive midfielders (Germany’s Mesut Ozil experienced this difficulty against Spain in the semi-final). The W-W circumnavigates this problem by placing two attacking midfielders in behind the centre-forward (without the loss of either a secure central-midfield or width). If the opposition switch to a formation with wingers, then the full-backs can return to more orthodox defensive positions. Therefore, as the Spain/Brazil model of 4-2-3-1 gains more adherents over forthcoming years, perhaps the W-W could become a viable response.

The Capello Project 2010: the end!

Throughout the qualification campaign it appeared that Fabio Capello had struck upon a workable formula. His England side were arranged under 4-4-2, but it appeared that 4-2-3-1 inhered in this approach as Gareth Barry and Frank Lampard were conservative in central midfield and Wayne Rooney would drop deep from attack. Capello also fielded a target man, Emile Heskey, so that he could provide an advanced apex for the team structure. Steven Gerrard tucked in from left-midfield to help out in central areas when required. An orthodox winger, such as Theo Walcott or Aaron Lennon, was placed on the right.

This approach did not yield great success over World Cup 2010. England left the tournament having beaten just one team – Slovenia. Tournament football does come down to fine margins – whilst the international elite are fairly hermetic, isolated events can still be the difference between an excellent and indifferent tournament for a second-tier nation. If it was not for Robert Green’s unfortunate error against the US, then England should have won Group C. This outcome would have opened up the knock-out rounds much more kindly for England, and they could have made the semi-finals. And whilst Germany very much deserved to beat England in the initial knock-out round, it was only an incorrect decision from the officials which prevented the score from being levelled late in the first-half. Entering the second-half on equal terms would have left England less vulnerable to an excellent counterattacking side.

Capello did deviate somewhat from the strategic pattern that he had established over the qualifiers. For example, Jermain Defoe replaced Heskey following the Algeria game. Whilst Defoe scored the winner against Slovenia his broader contribution was slight and Capello should perhaps have reverted to a target-man for the Germany game. Against superior opposition, Heskey or Peter Crouch might have offered the team a broader range of attributes than a goal-poacher such as Defoe. James Milner also came into the side, as a more pragmatic right-sided option than Aaron Lennon. Whilst Milner played well against Slovenia, he made little impact against Germany.

Better England line-up v Germany?

The inclusion of Gerrard on the left worked over the qualifiers as he had the freedom to drift inside to influence the play. But in South Africa this ploy merely unbalanced the side. Against Algeria in particular, England seemed to be playing a lopsided 4-1-3-2 with no left-midfielder in place at all (when 4-3-3 would have been a better configuration against Algeria’s three-man central-defence). The populist call was to play Gerrard centrally behind Rooney. But Rooney did not carry his good form from the Premier League into this tournament and would have been ill-equipped for a lone-forward role. Against Germany it may have been a better ruse to move Gerrard centrally and position Rooney on the left. This would have reinforced the team in midfield, and Rooney’s presence on the flank might have meant that Thomas Muller would have been more distracted by defensive duties.

The central-midfield was also exposed at World Cup 2010. Neither Barry nor Lampard is a natural holding player, with Lampard very much an attacking midfielder at club level. They may have provided a pragmatic pairing over the qualifiers, but were undone badly against Germany. During the tournament it became apparent that 4-2-3-1 does not inhere in Capello’s 4-4-2: operating within an outmoded system England were overrun,  outmanouevred and unable to respond to the tactical superiority of Germany (and Algeria). 

England missed a genuine defensive midfielder such as Owen Hargreaves who would at least have offered pace and snappy challenges in front of the back four. A fit and in form Rio Ferdinand would also have helped. So injuries and bad luck may have hindered this campaign, but the Capello Project lost both flexibility and coherence over World Cup 2010, as England were again exposed as being some way short of the best international sides.

World Cup 2014: wildcards!

Speculation has already begun with regard to the players who will be replacing England’s “golden generation” – a generation which is approaching the end of its tenure as custodians of the nation’s hopes. World Cup 2010 has again exposed England as being too sluggish and inflexible to compete with the best at international level. England haven’t made a major tournament final in 44 years, and were made to look particularly mediocre by Germany this year. History suggests that England need to start playing a different type of football at international level if the pattern is to be broken. Players are needed that can help to embed a more contemporary footballing culture.

It’s not at all clear who is lined up to become England’s equivalents of German stars Memut Ozil and Thomas Muller. But several young players are tipped to make the leap to senior international level and these include midfielders Jack Rodwell and Jack Wilshere, and defender Keiran Gibbs. It’s also not easy to predict who will be joining Wayne Rooney in attack, but Frazier Campbell is one possibility. Below WCC explores a few wildcards that might make an impact at World Cup 2014.

Fabian Delph has only been lightly used at Aston Villa since Martin O’Neill signed him from Leeds. He’s a lightweight, but skilful and mobile midfielder. Although he doesn’t appear very robust, he is brave and committed. Delph is comfortable on the ball and likes to run at players. He could therefore develop into the type of contemporary playmaker that England require. Whilst he has been used centrally during his sporadic appearances for Aston Villa, it appears that he has the requisites to perform to good effect on the flank. Delph should hopefully have opportunities to build upon his reputation this forthcoming season.

18-year-old Phil Jones broke into Blackburn’s first team towards the end of last season, playing in their final nine games of the Premier League campaign. England’s centre-back position used to be one of England’s strongest and most settled positions. But it’s not clear who will step up to replace injury-prone Rio Ferdinand and one-paced John Terry. Jones’s appearances for Blackburn received favourable comment, and also coincided with a reasonable period of form for a side that finished 10th in the Premier League. Jones was confronted with Didier Drogba on his league debut and he acquitted himself well. He’s only 5ft 11” tall, so could offer something different to the large and slow English central defender template.

WCC devised a method of weighting Fantasy Football statistics, which set out to show players whose talents may be masked by the fact that they resided within  low performing teams. This approach showed that Jamie O’Hara’s performances over last season’s Premier League campaign were perhaps more significant than the brute facts suggested – O’Hara was on loan from Tottenham with relegated Portsmouth. O’Hara isn’t the fastest but he is a hard-working and tenacious midfielder who could perhaps become England’s Sami Khedira! He’s left-footed and can play on the flank or centrally. If O’Hara plays for a high profile Premier League team, then he could also be given a chance at senior international level.