It Needs Explaining To Me?

[goonivan!]

First half was poor but who'd have changed a side that had just won 4 - 0 away? It was obvious early on that we needed more width but there are probably only a couple of managers in the league confident (or secure) enough to change their starting line up afer 15 minutes.

Millen is a new boss learning his way at a club that wants instant success.

I'm sure that there are at least three teams worse than us this season and that the time to judge is next season. I also think that we have too many players which is making decisions harder as everyone wants a game. We desperately need a clear out before we sign a couple of key players to improve the first team.

In the meantime Keith has time to learn a bit more, I'd like to see him shout a bit more though!!

[chinapig]

First half was poor but who'd have changed a side that had just won 4 - 0 away? It was obvious early on that we needed more width but there are probably only a couple of managers in the league confident (or secure) enough to change their starting line up afer 15 minutes.

Millen is a new boss learning his way at a club that wants instant success.

I'm sure that there are at least three teams worse than us this season and that the time to judge is next season. I also think that we have too many players which is making decisions harder as everyone wants a game. We desperately need a clear out before we sign a couple of key players to improve the first team.

In the meantime Keith has time to learn a bit more, I'd like to see him shout a bit more though!!

Me! Leeds have 2 good wingers and a competitive midfield. We needed the same to counter them. Not doing so gave them far too much space out wide, especially Snodgrass, against our two not very good full backs. Keith eventually grasped that by which time it was far too late. Being highly qualified doesn't mean you will necessarily make the right decisions. As you suggest it takes self confidence to change things, not something that shines out of Keith. Still if you appoint a novice manager he will make a lot of mistakes. Let's hope he does not learn at our expense.

[Rob k]

K

[chinapig]

K

Que?

[Rob k]

Que?

Sorry i was on my Iphone so dont really know what happened there!

I agree with what you say,Millen got it all wrong yesterday and it was obvious to eveyone in the ground it was not working after 10 mins, maybe he needs to sit in the dolman half way up instead of the dugout for the first half and get a poper view of what is going on??? For me i now just want to get to 50 pts asap and then we re-evaluate where we go from there, personally thats only one way and thats to get rid of millen and get a proper manager in.

MILLEN OUT

[Johners26]

I once worked with a chap whose mantra was "don't believe in your own PR, that's when things go wrong". All of Millen's interviews since we hit a poor Preston side three times on the break, suggested to me that was falling foul of believing his own PR, and was going to go with the same 11 that started the second half at Preston. To me it felt like watching a car crash in slow motion, or an episode of Frasier. You just knew that it would end in tears.

Sure, he switched things around at half time last week and we went from 1-0 up to 4-0 up, and Millen got applauded for being bold, which he was. But lets not forget that before we got our second goal Preston had two great chances to equalise, and were looking no less dangerous than in the first half. They only faded when we snaffled our second goal. Going 433 then worked when:

(a) you are playing a team that had conceded 50 goals at home already

(b) you are 1-0 up

© you don't mind giving up chances at the other end and riding your luck

(d) you are playing a team that has just sold its best striker (Parkin to Cardiff)

(e) you are playing a side at the bottom of the table (low confidence etc)

(f) you are clinical and take your chances

Also, to be fair, Adomah was looking to me to be a little tired in the first half, and I would have taken him off even if that meant sticking to 442.

Now, lets look at Leeds. Which of the above do we think applied to the Leeds match? I would suggest none!

We were about to play a team that is flying, that is well organised, going to be patient especially away from home, full of confidence, and beat us with 3 quick late goals already this season. Leeds were always going to be more clinical than Preston and therefore an open game was much less in our interests than it had been last week. Most importantly of all, the game was starting at 0-0 and so they would not be chasing the game like Preston were. All of this info was readily available to Millen all last week.

What conclusions should we draw?

- Millen (and his staff) got carried away with a lucky 45 minute performance

- Millen and the coaching team don't actually have a clear plan (they abandoned their long stated commitment to 442 after just 45 minutes of productive but lucky football: "I have always liked 433 but you need the players" - Keith Millen last week - Keep looking Keith mate!)

- Formations need to be chosen to suit situations (just because they work once... )

- Just because we have loads of strikers and no creative midfielder doesn't mean we should play them all

I would also suggest that it is easier to switch from 442 to 433 at 0-0 or 1-0 up and become more attacking , than to do the reverse when 1-0 or 2-0 down and get back in the game. Chopping and changing formations also undermines his credibility with the players and will confuse them (what the hell must Woolford be thinking now?).

Millen is a 'young' coach who was dealt a terrible hand at the start of the season and has improved the squad in his transfer dealings. He has to learn from yesterday's predictable mistake, because that is what it was.

No more nonsense, lets start games 442 and then adapt from there when the game situation requires it.

Rant over.

Happy to get behind the lads and Keith. City till I die/it kills me

[kiwicolin]

[Mr Popodopolous]

Football used to be an easy game. The big lads played at centre-half and centre-forward, the hard lads played at full-back, the bright lads played at inside forward, the hard lads who were a bit bright and the bright lads who were a bit hard played at wing-half, and the little, quick lads played on the wing. Left-footers played on the left and right-footers played on the right. And the one with no mates went in goal.

Eight decades on, and it's all rather more complicated, and not just because not all goalkeepers these days are entirely socially dysfunctional. Wingers disappeared for a while, and became a luxury item, almost a museum piece, but now they're back, all over the place, and the tendency is for them to play on the opposite flank.

There have always been a handful who did that. Tom Finney, for instance, played as a right-footed left-wing in the greatest English forward line there has ever been along with Stanley Matthews, Stan Mortensen, Tommy Lawton and Wilf Mannion but that was only because Matthews was already installed in his preferred position. Later, players such as Dennis Tueart, Chris Waddle, Marc Overmars and Robert Pires, operating on the opposite side through preference, were highly effective coming in on to their stronger foot.

But now these inside-out wingers are everywhere. At Barcelona, Leo Messi is proving himself probably the greatest individual talent since Diego Maradona, cutting in from the right on to his stronger left foot. Arjen Robben has resurrected Bayern Munich's season doing much the same. Cristiano Ronaldo is right-footed and plays on the right, but is so strong with his left that he too is constantly shifting inside, looking for shooting opportunities.

It's the same in England. Ashley Young is a right-footed left-winger. Adam Johnson is left-footed but has made an impact at Manchester City on the right, while Craig Bellamy, a right-footer on the left, has arguably been their best player this season. Niko Kranjcar plays on the left but drifts infield on to his right. Damien Duff spent most of his career on the left but has prospered on the right for Fulham. At Wigan, the left-footed Charles N'Zogbia is having a decent season on the right. Steed Malbranque has been a revelation in recent weeks on the left for Sunderland. At national level, Steven Gerrard has become the preferred choice on the left of the attacking midfield trident when Fabio Capello opts for 4-2-3-1. So why is the tactic so effective, and why has it suddenly become so widespread?

The death of the traditional winger

Herbert Chapman, who foresaw most developments, was suspicious of the winger even before the 1925 change in the offside law prompted the shift away from 2-3-5 to W-M. His Huddersfield team that won the FA Cup in 1922 and went on to lift three successive league titles featured two wingers in George Richardson and Billy Smith who eschewed the touchline-hugging stereotype. Inside passing, Chapman argued, was "more deadly, if less spectacular" than the "senseless policy of running along the lines and centring just in front of the goalmouth, where the odds are nine to one on the defenders".

Chapman's Arsenal side that itself completed a hat-trick of championships was thoroughly modern in the sense of having wingers who regularly drifted infield, making the most of the long, accurate passing of the inside-forward Alex James. Yet for all their success, the image of the winger, isolated, bandy-legged, sashaying his way past the full-back and crossing, remained to English eyes the creative ideal. Perhaps the hurly-burly of English midfields, or the fact that from autumn onwards the only firm ground was to be found out wide, meant flair was necessarily pushed to the flanks. Perhaps it was simply nostalgia.

In the year immediately following the World War Two, there was a great flowering of the English winger with Matthews, Finney, Len Shackleton, Bobby Langton, Jimmy Mullen, George Robb, Johnny Hancocks and Charlie Mitten. The problem was that they emerged just as the collectivist football of the Communist bloc was demonstrating the outmodedness of the English focus on the individual.

Mikhail Yakushin, the manager of the 1945 Dinamo Moscow tourists, for instance, was scornful of Matthews. "The principle of collective play is the guiding one in Soviet football," he said. "A player must not only be good in general; he must be good for the particular team. His individual qualities are high, but we put collective football first and individual football second, so we do not favour his style as we think teamwork would suffer." It took the 6-3 mauling at home to Hungary in 1953 to bring that message home six months after what many saw as the apogee of wing-play, Matthews's performance in the 1953 FA Cup final.

What really did for the old-school winger, though, was the shift from the three at the back of the W-M to a back four, a process which began in Hungary, the Soviet Union and Brazil in the 1950s and was universalised after Brazil's successes in the 1958 and 1962 World Cups. The back three of the W-M operated on a pivot; the ideal for attacking teams was to switch play rapidly from one flank to the other, so "turning" the defence, and providing space for the winger so he could be travelling at speed by the time he reached the full-back. Add an extra defender, and that acceleration room simply isn't there any more.

It was that realisation that led Alf Ramsey and Viktor Maslov to develop the 4-4-2 (or, more accurately in both cases, the 4-1-3-2) in the mid-1960s. As their ideas took hold, the winger became a wide midfielder, a shuttler, somebody who might be expected to cross a ball but was also meant to put in a defensive shift. The lop-sided 4-3-3s of the 1970s could still accommodate something approximating to a winger, but by the 1980s they had become increasingly rare, evolved out of existence by the dominance of 4-4-2 and 3-5-2 which Johan Cruyff described as "the death of football" precisely because it militated against wing-play.

The reinvention of the winger

As 4-2-3-1 and 4-1-2-3 came to vie with 4-4-2, so the winger could be introduced. Dribbling was a way of disrupting the predictability that 4-4-2 often seemed to engender, and the deployment of two holding midfielders provided the platform that enabled the incorporation of dribblers again. Why, though, do so many prefer to turn infield rather than doing what wingers used to do, trying to get to the goal-line and sweep in a cross?

With a lone centre-forward, of course, there is a need for the advanced midfielders to provide goals (and conversely, it may be that many of the players now operating as wide forwards would in a previous age have been second strikers), particularly if that forward operates as a false nine, so that perhaps, to an extent, explains the modern directness.

But it also seems hard to explain the idea that the most lethal cross was a ball dragged back from the goal-line. It can be dangerous of course, raising doubt in a goalkeeper's mind as to whether he should come to claim or not, but there seems no reason why it should be more threatening than an inswinger delivered at pace (I'm not sure any stats exist to prove or disprove this, but if they do, please post a link).

In fact, intuitively, it would seem a ball whipped towards the far post that requires just a touch to divert it in or that will sneak in if nobody touches it is more dangerous. It also feels as though that sort of goal has become more common over the past decade or so. That may itself be a result of an increasing number of inside-out wingers, or it may be a result of the increased spin that can be imparted on modern balls, or even perhaps of the liberalisation of the offside law which forces teams to defend deeper an inswinger curving into the far post is obviously more dangerous if players are running into it six yards out than 15 yards out, both in terms of angle and the time a goalkeeper would have to react to a touch.

There are other advantages to a wide player coming inside. For one thing, given most full-backs still play on the traditional side, a winger taking him on on the inside is attacking his weaker foot. For another, a wide player drifting infield is opening space for an overlapping full-back, of whom there are an increasing number. The link-up of Pires and Ashley Cole at Arsenal was an early example of that; more recent examples include Ivan Rakitic and Danijel Pranjic for Croatia, Gerrard and Cole for England and, most obviously, Messi and Dani Alves for Barcelona.

And then there is the issue of acceleration room. A full-back pushed tight on a wide forward does not allow him to accelerate down the line, but by cutting inside on to his stronger foot, the forward opens up room on the diagonal. It is that, for instance, that allowed Messi to score his first against Stuttgart last week. It was rapidly obvious what he was going to do as he turned inside but the best efforts of four defenders couldn't stop him because of the pace he was going at by the time he got within shooting range.

The two types of inside-out winger

Not that the wide forward has to use the room to dribble into. Darren Bent's second goal for Sunderland against Birmingham on Saturday, for instance, came because Malbranque checked inside, and had space to measure an angled pass to the forward with his stronger foot. Earlier in the season, playing on the right, Malbranque looked past it, too slow to beat his full-back on the outside, so right-footed that when he came inside he resembled a canoe with only one paddle, turning always in a circle away from goal. Switching to the left means the lack of pace no longer matters, and he effectively becomes a playmaker who happens to operate wide.

That certainly has been the role occupied by Kranjcar and Luka Modric at Spurs; in their case, the flank becomes an area where a playmaker can still be accommodated in the English game. Others, though, such as Ronaldo and Bellamy, are more obviously forwards, who just happen to start wide. Wayne Rooney's aerial ability perhaps means that centre-forward is his best position, but previous seasons have suggested that he too could occupy that role.

And in between, both playmaker and forward, is Messi, a genius for all the ages. It is hard to believe any player starting wide has had such an impact on games so regularly since Matthews (and even then you wonder whether British pundits, conditioned to see greatness in wingers, weren't seeing what they wanted to see).

Wide forwards can be stopped, but it takes a major change for the defending team. Alvaro Arbeloa's marking job on Messi for Liverpool in 2007 shows how effective it can be switching a right-footed full-back to play on the left flank, and Young's slightly stuttering form for Aston Villa earlier this season shows what can happen when full-backs get used to showing a player outside rather than inside.

But then a player of the class of Ronaldo or Messi (as he is today) will simply go outside (could that, in fact, be why Barça bought Zlatan Ibrahimovic, to give them an aerial presence if Messi were forced into crossing more often?), and playing a right-footer at left-back or a left-footer at right-back immediately impairs their capacity to overlap.

So, the wide forward is hard to combat, scores goals, can operate as a playmaker and creates space for attacking full-backs. All he doesn't do is get to the by-line and curl in away swingers. He seems such a potent threat that the real puzzle is why he didn't emerge earlier

That is exactly the way of thinking behind it, as mentioned on another thread. But yeah, that sums up as a prime example of just how constantly fluid and evolving football tactics are these days.

Of course, personnel available play a pivotal part of formations and strategies to be deployed.

[Simon79]

Snodgrass did ok on the right didnt he? Just a thought.

[InCider]

The manager was just wrong.

The forum wankfest about 433 and playing Clarkson as some sort of midfielder and Woolford right side because of one result against the worst side in the division was laughable.

TBF, I was one of those involved in the w*nkfest, as you succinctly put it. I honestly think that if Millen had changed to a 4-4-2, that everyone would be claiming he was clueless, as it did work a treat in the 2nd half at Preston. I did have doubts on Friday though, that it might not be the best formation for Leeds at home. I have to admit that I (and Millen) were both wrong (despite the fact that Millen is never criticised on here!). However hindsight is a wonderful thing. It clearly doesn't play to the strengths of some players, Pitman for example. Riaz was also right that Adomah shouldn't have been rested. I think that you may have a point about Millen trying to appease fans in his team selection. However, as I've stated, he would have been heavily criticised if he had gone 4-4-2 and lost the game.

[Andy082005]

Funn how some many supported it before the game and complain now

are you Keiths mum or wife??

[Andy082005]

for once, he has a point. Pretty much the ONLY team selection called for was the one Millen started with...

But I suppose you wanted a 4-4-2 and kept that opinion quiet?

whats this myth that everyone seems to believe that just because a formation works one week, its a case of "hurrah, weve cracked it....it always work". Its total bollo*ks!

I ran a weekend team for nearly 6 years, you take each game as it comes. Its not complete rocket science. One week, we may have had top of the league, so I would set out maybe 4-4-2, or 4-5-1....the next week, bottom of the league, you set up differently again, maybe 3-5-2, even 4-3-3.

Millen is tactically naive and is not smart enough to tactically win games. Its all well and good realising half way though a game how to change it, but like yesterday, it was to little to late. At this standard, you cannot afford to give teams a 45 minute head start every week.

[kiwicolin]

whats this myth that everyone seems to believe that just because a formation works one week, its a case of "hurrah, weve cracked it....it always work". Its total bollo*ks!

I ran a weekend team for nearly 6 years, you take each game as it comes. Its not complete rocket science. One week, we may have had top of the league, so I would set out maybe 4-4-2, or 4-5-1....the next week, bottom of the league, you set up differently again, maybe 3-5-2, even 4-3-3.

Millen is tactically naive and is not smart enough to tactically win games. Its all well and good realising half way though a game how to change it, but like yesterday, it was to little to late. At this standard, you cannot afford to give teams a 45 minute head start every week.

Millen got the tatics right at Preston when he changed it around for the second half.

So please give him some praise.

[Esmond Million's Bung]

Millen got the tatics right at Preston when he changed it around for the second half.

So please give him some praise.

Yes he did and got a lot of praise. He also got unwarranted praise for changing things at half time at home to Leicester, he got lucky because Leicester could'nt hit the target, but he nearly left it too late. He got it wrong at Hull and waited until we were 2-0 down before he made changes, he waited until 62 minutes yesterday to change things and we were already chasing the game.

[Andy082005]

Millen got the tatics right at Preston when he changed it around for the second half.

So please give him some praise.

Its like I put on another thread, he has to start getting things right from the start. At Preston, fair play for changing it when it needed to be changed.....but from what ive heard and what ive read, if we were playing someone a bit better, we could have been at least 3-1 down at half time. Luckily we were playing fodder.

We simply cannot keep allowing teams 45 minutes before we "get the tactics right". We need our manager to start getting tactics right straight from the off.....if he cannot do that, then he isnt upto the job.

[Frank Reynolds]

No, it wasn't the only thing Millen could do at all and it proved to be a mistake didn't it?

I understand it, but it was wrong. I'm not interested in saying told you so, but 433 isn't successful for us because we don't have the right players for it, I've said that fairly consistently.

We need to pick a system, and maybe one more attacking and one more defensive variation on that system, learn it thoroughly and recruit players into it. Not swap it around so much.

Did you notice the number of passes to nowhere or the number of times two players went to the same man today?

This. Enough of this 'different clubs in the bag' theory.

Why are we purchasing players and then changing their positions after one good half of football? Where is the longevity in that? If Millen felt that Woolford would be more trouble for the Preston left-back than right-back and his game would cause more problems then great, thats exactly what I want to see in a manager; someone who can react to the flow of a game and recognise gaps in the opposition. That doesn't mean that you can do the same with Leeds. Why do we insist on bringing players to the club to seemingly plug gaps in our team, then play them in a different position?!

We need to find a system that will suit the spine of this team. Next season that maybe James, Fontaine, Elliott, Woolford, Adomah, Maynard and Pitman say. Then, we recruit players who the manager believes will be good foils for those players. You cannot do that if one minute you feel that Martyn Woolford is a left-winger, but then because he roasted a full-back on the opposite side of the pitch his future lies there! Chopping and changing is rarely productive and at this level players, for the most part, are not adaptable enough.

As for the Millen out thing, it's a tad ridiculous. What I feel should've happened is that Millen should have been given a deal til the end of the season and then the club could have acted from there in terms of extentions or removal. We need to plan for the future, and ten months would have given us a good indication of what to expect. What we've seen so far is that Millen's player recruitment seems good, but that tactically he has a lot to learn. One thing that I believe is essential is that in the summer we change our coaching staff. Fresh ideas, and Millen's own men are vital if we are planning long-term with him at the helm.

[Andy082005]

This. Enough of this 'different clubs in the bag' theory.

Why are we purchasing players and then changing their positions after one good half of football? Where is the longevity in that? If Millen felt that Woolford would be more trouble for the Preston left-back than right-back and his game would cause more problems then great, thats exactly what I want to see in a manager; someone who can react to the flow of a game and recognise gaps in the opposition. That doesn't mean that you can do the same with Leeds. Why do we insist on bringing players to the club to seemingly plug gaps in our team, then play them in a different position?!

We need to find a system that will suit the spine of this team. Next season that maybe James, Fontaine, Elliott, Woolford, Adomah, Maynard and Pitman say. Then, we recruit players who the manager believes will be good foils for those players. You cannot do that if one minute you feel that Martyn Woolford is a left-winger, but then because he roasted a full-back on the opposite side of the pitch his future lies there! Chopping and changing is rarely productive and at this level players, for the most part, are not adaptable enough.

As for the Millen out thing, it's a tad ridiculous. What I feel should've happened is that Millen should have been given a deal til the end of the season and then the club could have acted from there in terms of extentions or removal. We need to plan for the future, and ten months would have given us a good indication of what to expect. What we've seen so far is that Millen's player recruitment seems good, but that tactically he has a lot to learn. One thing that I believe is essential is that in the summer we change our coaching staff. Fresh ideas, and Millen's own men are vital if we are planning long-term with him at the helm.

Totally agree with this, but I also feel that along with the coaching staff, Millen needs to walk aswell.

We need a complete shake up behind the scenes, and in order for us to move forward, we need to get rid of the dead wood. Millen is what I class as "dead wood". Him and Johnson both ran out of ideas, and since Millen took over, I have seen nothing ON the pitch to warrant him being our manager next season.