by Mike Martin @thefootietweet
Pickering Town are not the 1953 Hungarian side that made England re-think the whole concept of association football. Nor is coach Mitch Cook often mistaken for Rinus Michels. But both are proving a fascinating diversion in the Northern Counties East League Premier Division.
Pickering Town are not the 1953 Hungarian side that made England re-think the whole concept of association football. Nor is coach Mitch Cook often mistaken for Rinus Michels. But both are proving a fascinating diversion in the Northern Counties East League Premier Division.
Regular readers of What A Hit Son! – hello, Baz; hello, Stig – will by now be aware that your humble servant is a fan of Cook’s methods, particularly having the first team coach also take charge of the U19 team, who play with an identical formation.
Identical, that is, in that it is a fairly fluid 4-3-3 formation. But expecting somebody to imagine how a team play simply by telling them how many defenders, midfielders and attackers they use is akin to assuming somebody could imagine the work of Shakespeare upon being told that it was written in English.
The senior side’s 4-3-3 is not a normal 4-3-3. That the first choice left back, Dean Craig, is right-footed is hardly earth-shattering; lots of teams use one, often because they have run out of decent left-footers. But Pickering Town have a left-footed full-back and a very decent looking one too: Joe Danby. He plays at right back.
It has often occurred to me as odd that the modern trend for playing wingers – or, perhaps more accurately, ‘wide forwards’ – on the ‘wrong’ side of the pitch has not been followed by a similar approach to full-backs. The inside-out winger is now commonplace, particularly in teams which play with three forwards.
At Euro 2008, the Netherlands played with Dirk Kuyt on the right and Arjen Robben – when he recovered from his injury – on the left, each as fairly orthodox wingers feeding the striker Ruud van Nistelrooy. By the time last year’s World Cup came around, Robben had moved to the right. At Bayern Munich he had a club prepared to accede to his constant requests to play on the right; largely, perhaps, because the right-footed Franck Ribéry always wanted to play from the left.
At Euro 2008, the Netherlands played with Dirk Kuyt on the right and Arjen Robben – when he recovered from his injury – on the left, each as fairly orthodox wingers feeding the striker Ruud van Nistelrooy. By the time last year’s World Cup came around, Robben had moved to the right. At Bayern Munich he had a club prepared to accede to his constant requests to play on the right; largely, perhaps, because the right-footed Franck Ribéry always wanted to play from the left.
Again, he missed the early tournament matches with injury: Kuyt stayed on the right and Rafael van der Vaart was used, not to the greatest effect, as a left winger. Robben’s first start of the championship was in the second round against Slovakia. He started on the right, with Kuyt moved to the left to accommodate him. Seventeen minutes in, Robben cut inside and scored. He was the dominant player of the match.
How, though, do you deal with such a player? In February 2006, Chelsea met Barcelona at Stamford Bridge in the first leg of a UEFA Champions League Round of 16 tie. It was the first time Lionel Messi had played in England and he left a lasting impression. In the first quarter of an hour, he tormented Chelsea’s limited left-back Asier del Horno. Del Horno did not deserve to be sent off after a collision between the two players early on but the damage to his reputation was done nevertheless and he was quietly sold the following summer after just one season at Chelsea.
It was argued at the time – by Mr Glanville, if memory isn’t deserting me – that perhaps it would have been better to field Paulo Ferreira, who has done a job on the left since then, particularly for Portugal at Euro 2008. The right-footed Ferreira would not have been as week as the left-footed del Horno whenever Messi cut inside.
Perhaps using inside-out full-backs would serve as tacit recognition that many wide forwards are not really wingers. With teams outside of British football so less dependent on crossing and heading as a source of goals – Paul Gardner wrote on this schism at length in the January 2011 issue of World Soccer – perhaps there is less need for an old fashioned winger, just as the target man centre forward is also no longer ubiquitous.
Full-backs are now regarded as attacking players as well. Could inside-out full-backs bring a new, adventurous dimension to a team's structure.
Pickering’s own front three are encouraged to be adaptable, rather than having a traditional striker and wingers. The ‘striker’ Lyle Hillier often moves wide or even into deeper positions, with wingers – two from Darren Clough, Robbie Hawkes and Josh Greening – regurlaly swapping sides or trying their luck down the middle.
The logic of this approach is that crossing is unreliable. If a central player passed with such frequent inaccuracy as many wide players in the Premier League cross they would probably get the old shepherd’s crook. I cannot recall seeing Pickering score a header from a cross in open player in the six months or so since Cook took over.
With old-fashioned crossing out, the importance of the clinical through ball is increased. The pass between the full-back and central defender is one of Barcelona and Spain’s specialities: check out David Villa’s second goal of his hat trick against Russia in the Euro 2008 group match. That was played by Andrés Iniesta, cutting inside and knocking it through with the outside of his right boot. But that is a specialist skill, not every player can play such perfectly measured passes with their little toe.
If attacking full-backs can cut inside and play a through ball with their stronger foot, it opens up a new way of breaking down the opposition. Furthermore, it will draw opposition full-backs inside, creating space on the flanks for the front three without the need to go ‘two on one’, taking the attacking full-back away from his defensive position.
On Saturday afternoon, both of Pickering’s full-backs scored as they beat Hallam 4-2. Craig’s was a typical left-back’s goal: a ball across the pitch from the right not dealt with and a wide player turning up unmarked at the back post. Danby’s was different: cutting in from the right, he controlled an aerial ball with his chest, cut inside the Hallam defender and fired home with his left foot.
It was a fine goal but not one you will see a typical right-footed right-back such as Maicon or Philipp Lahm scoring. It is a speciality of Glen Johnson, a truly two-footed player; it won him Goal of the Season two campaigns ago when he scored for Portsmouth against Hull City. It would take an age to prove it but I suspect full-backs score in open play more often when playing on the ‘wrong’ side of the pitch. Lahm’s fine tournament goals for Germany – against Costa Rica in the opening match of the 2006 World Cup and against Turkey in the Euro 2008 semi final – were scored from left back.
Danby and Craig are also set-piece takers. There is a general preference for corner kicks or free-kicks from wide attacking positions to be inswinging: Pickering’s formation allows this to happen without the full-backs having to run across to the other side of the pitch, undermining their defensive position.
So is this the future, or is it just one manager trying a new idea to gain an advantage on the teams around him? For new tactics to become widespread requires trailblazers in high-profile positions. Experimenting with wingers is, perhaps, easier, as wingers are often seen as ‘luxury’ players who exist alongside, rather than as part of, the structure of the team. Whether top flight managers will be prepared to risk ‘mucking around’ with their back four is another question altogether.
