Totaalvoetbal and movement towards a treatise on football

This month, as we are between seasons, I have stayed mentally busy.  After completing my last assignments for my Yoga Sport Science course, I have been reading widely, including revisiting Jonathan Wilson´s excellent Inverting the Pyramid, a variety of Soccer Journal back issues, including David Trapp´s thought provoking short ¨A Soccer Renaissance?¨ and Delgado and Mendez´s ¨Tactical Periodization¨ and from Journal of Sport Psychology in Action, Gilbert et. al.´s 2010 piece on coaching philosophy ¨The Pyramid of Teaching Success in Sport.¨  It has me thinking about what makes a teacher, what makes a complete player (complete being a common descriptor of the very best lately, especially in light of the excellence of the Spanish team at Euro 2012) what makes a good coach, and what makes a good manager, and of course, where do all of these various ¨goods¨ intersect. 

The work I´ve been doing preparing for the season has been outlining session plans and periodized fitness plans for Leeds United LFC, where Andy Burgess has been brought on as manager, and I´m again providing services as a technical consultant.  I´m also updating the U9/10 curriculum for my local club, Century United, as we prepare for the upcoming season.  Meanwhile, I´m still doing private sessions for both yoga and soccer clients, so my professional life, such as it is at the moment, is mirroring my reading list: a search for the complete coach, complete manager, complete player.

The term Total Football arose after the Rinus Michel´s system and approach was well and truly mature, after the 1974 World Cup.  The etymology of the term is telling: Gropius, the leading Bauhaus designer and architect was a proponent of total architecture as early as the 20s -- that all design should take into account all of the particular uses and interactions of the object and should be designed taking into account all available construction materials and techniques, without regard to tradition or previous forms or styles.  The Ajax team of the early 70s (and their counterparts at Dynamo Kyiv under Lobanovskyi) was steeped in the innovation of the methodo, referred to the verrou and catenaccio, but neither Ajax nor Dynamo were bound by anything that went before.  More importantly, there was a holistic approach to training: from youth development, training, fitness, nutrition, and obviously the functions of each player on the field.  Sports science, in its infancy (but most progressed in the Netherlands and in the USSR) was used to improve the athlete to his optimum.  Each player was expected to be able to interchange freely throughout the park, and, much like with total architecture, was valued in the utility of interaction and the squad was to be appreciated as singular complex system. 

Holistic football is perhaps a better translation of totaalvoetbal than total football.  It is, in many ways, the antithesis of the moneyball approach so touted today as the wave of the future.  Where the common theme of performance analysis is reductivist -- measuring the value of a player by analyzing discrete indicators, total football is holistic in its approach -- viewing the game as a singular system.  This isn´t to say that performance analysis is useless however, as the insights it provides can generate reliable indicators of how the whole networked system of a squad at play can operate. 

Moving back to the individual athlete, thinking about the holistic approach of course brings me to thoughts near and dear to my heart, yoga and football.  Sport science gives us very good measures of fitness that predict work rate and injury prevention, and tests exercise protocols to improve fitness.  However, at the end of the day, the athlete is a complex system that reductivist measures cannot quantify.  Why is Leo Messi the best footballer in the world?  Why doesn´t he get injured with frequency?  The data gives us hints, but ultimately it is because the whole system -- not just Leo Messi´s muscles, tendons, joints, blood, &c &c -- but Leo himself that works together to be the athlete that he is.  The sum cannot be adequately described as the addends. 

So the exercises that my athletes do that I pick from yoga, or the yoga sessions I lead are somewhat secondary to my point: it is the holistic attitude, looking at an athlete as more than just a summation of techniques and physical attributes that must inform coaches and managers.  I am no Luddite arguing against use of every tool that sport science and analytics gives us, but for total football, those tools must be used to organize, teach, engender, and nourish the player

Still a lot of thinking to do, but I am convinced the future lies not in the cold numbers of the game, but in its warm beating heart . . .

Random Thoughts on Euro 2012

Although I watched something like 20-22 of the Euro matches, coming in the last weeks of my coursework, I watched more as a spectator than an analyst.  Which, I think, is a bit of a shame, as it was a deeply interesting tournament -- dominated by defensive thinking, yet only two scoreless matches; extensive use of the false nine, yet more scoring from headed crosses, the classic #9 goal, than any tournament in memory; and the continued decline of the importance of the direct free kick.  So, while I still have a thousand words to write for my final paper, a few random observations and thoughts . . .

You don´t have to have a #9, but you have to get in the box

France were the biggest disappointment to me because coming in, I felt that with Nasri, Ribéry, Cabaye, Maluda, and above all, Benzema, France could be as dynamic and exciting as anyone going forward.  Instead, they looked disconnected, unimaginative, and flat.  Benzema was the biggest disappointment, but I have to question his positioning.  With Real Madrid, he has thrived all year in the channels, turning center backs inside out.  For France, he played deeper and wider, oftimes in front of the opposition´s right back, which, if I am defending, is as close as I want Karim Benzema to my goal, ever.  The French did generate some attacking down both flanks, notably from Ribéry and the excellent Jérémy Ménez, who I had not seen at all this year at PSG.  In the end, though, they had little bite to the attack, looked dull against the English, impotent against the Swedes, and just not nearly good enough against the Spanish.

While the French played with a number nine who didn´t act like one, the Spanish experimented, and looked at their best, playing 4-6-0.  However, there were many (somewhat justifiable) complaints of the Spanish being dull.  The Spanish possession is a massive defensive weapon -- you can´t score against them if you can never get the ball -- but without an incisive edge, it was left late (Croatia) or not at all (kicks from the spot with Portugal.)  As many expected, Spain had another gear that they found in the first five minutes of the final, flying at the Italians from all angles.  Silva scored with his head and Jordi Alba burst into the penalty area like Ian Rush ca. 1984.  Neither are number nines, but the game always needs someone getting there like a house on fire, and that´s what Spain did.

Injuries change everything

If Dennis Rammedahl doesn´t come up lame, Denmark likely go through instead of Portugal.  Although Spain was bossing the game and unlikely to be turned over, Thiago Motta coming up injured just the hour mark (less than five minutes after his introduction) ended the final as a competitive affair. Over the past 30 years, hamstring injury rates have not substantially changed.  With the massive amounts of money (at club level) and national pride at international level, not to mention the job of the manager at stake, I am surprised at the lack of progress in injury prevention, particularly with hamstrings, and especially in a summer tournament after a full professional season.  A recent (2008) clinical trial by Engbretsen et. al. at the Oslo Sports Trauma center showed only 21% compliance with rehabilitative training among elite players designated high risk for re-injury.  Mendigucia, Alentorn-Geli, and Brughelli wrote an excellent analysis of the current shortcomings of the reductionist approach to injury treatment in a recent (2012) article in British Journal of Sports Medicine. They argue for a more holistic approach that considers mobility and strength variables, along with movement efficiency, motor sequencing, and, importantly, behavior and environment.

A more holistic approach that is athlete centered, working towards high level of compliance with the rehab protocols and supported by good science across a wide range of variables?  Hmm -- yoga, anyone?  I won´t say Motta or Rammedahl wouldn´t have been hurt had their respective federations shelled out a few grand to bring a yoga coach along for the ride to Polkraine, but Denmark couldn´t have been any more eliminated.

England are nowhere near good enough (USA either)

Being an American with a lot of English friends, I hear much about ¨we just need X and we can win the Cup.¨ (Be that cup WC2014 or Eur2012).  The truth is that the Golden Generation never were that good, and in the US, we still don´t have a fullback, Donovan is still a role player, and Dempsey can´t carry an entire squad.  It´s not just that compared to Germany, Spain, Italy, Portugal, the English were inferior at every position, and they were, but ultimately the squad looked tired and uncreative, like they had a long plane ride from 1977 when the style of football they were playing may have worked.  The game is too fast, too technical, too fluid for the English or American player.  While England played well, the gap between the game at the top level and what the English play, much less the Americans, is so big that it cannot be reasonably hoped that either country do better than round of 16 in Brazil. 

The youth systems in both countries must get away from focusing on winning competitions and instead look to develop players.  What separates the Spanish, Italian, and German players from the English (or the Brazilian, Uruguayan, Argentine from the American) is match intelligence: visual processing, chunking of information, anticipation.  Those skills are developed at ages 10-14, but give almost no competitive advantage until at least 16 and really only at 18-22.  The skills that produce a competitive advantage at 10-14 -- dribbling speed, first touch, physical size, physical speed -- all either level out or don´t make much difference at 18-22.  Unless we fix the youth system, England can go the way of Hungary, and the USA never come to the fore.  Instead, we will both watch Premier League matches on Fox and Sky respectively and say, ¨too many damn foreigners¨ when the truth is our kids aren´t good enough to play with the foreigners in the EPL because we were too damn worried about beating the next town over in a U12 derby than actually teaching the kids how to think the game.

Andrea Pirlo is pure class

That is all.

Platini is making UEFA into as much of a joke as FIFA

The idiot with a megaphone counting down to kickoff is an annoyance.  The travel schedule is insane, and insanely expensive (resulting in a notable lack of fans at many venues).  Fining a player for displaying branded underwear is silly.  Making that fine 4x the fine for racist abuse is insulting.  Football should be played in front of people who care, not gangsters, Eurotrash, bankers, and rich American trust fund babies, all out for some ¨authentic culture.¨ Platini has been travelling amongst the rich too long.  We want our game back.

Spain are the team to beat in Brazil

Xavi Hernández will be 34 and Andrés Iniesta 30 in Brazil.  However, Thiago Alcântara will be 23; Cristian Tello will be 22; and the best left back in the world will be 25 (and if you think that is Ashley Cole, you seriously need help.)  The Barcelona factory keeps rolling.  I am too young to remember Pelé, Gérson, Jairzinho, Garrincha, Rivelino, Tostão, but it is a good age to be a football fan.  If Spain are to be beaten, I am confident it will be epic.