🔴Southgate bottled it after taking lead. No lessons learned from Croatia.
🔴Time taken to unleash subs was criminal, Mancini was proactive.
🔴Subbing Immobile changed the game
England fired out of the blocks. Italy did not expect English wing back to push up high from both flanks, let alone Kyle Walker making a surprise foray forward to outnumber Italy on the blindside.
Italy shifted across in haste, this time leaving space on the other flank.
England then began to play on the counter which was fine, as Chiesa was the only real threat. What a threat he was though, I have rarely seen Luke Shaw troubled as he was.
Chiesa's 1 v 1 ability is truly special, very direct and reminds me of Andrei Kanchelskis.
As we can see England's low block was very difficult to break down with Immobile in the side. He was not dynamic or skilful enough to trouble English centre backs and Insigne was too predictable from the left spot even if he did bring others into play very well.
Outnumbered.
Italy changed it up and put Insigne as a false 9 and another nippy wide forward in Berardi. This shook England up, as suddenly all of Italy's front three can beat men 1 v 1 and attract defenders.
England refused to get out of the low block and invited waves of pressure.
Gareth made some subs reluctantly but the first two I agreed with, but by not bringing on Grealish early enough - England's midfield just lacked any real quality or thrust. It was a workmanlike midfield lacking in pizzazz and they also lacked a central thrust.
This is what I would have gone with. DCL to take on the ageing legs of Italy, Sterling as a 10 to take on Jorginho and Grealish out wide much earlier. I would have brought on Bellingham, a box to box player who would be useful on the counter and Phillips was tiring.
Penalty subs... Do not mind that. Rashford missing? fine, he's a regular for United - shit happens.
Sancho? hmm, barely features under Gareth and has scored 1PK in 3 seasons at Dortmund? Saka... what on earth were these lads doing in the first 5 takers?
Did we practise this?
Left with a bitter taste. Southgate is the best manager we have had since Hoddle. However, the squad he has is stacked and he still has not solved the issue of being unable to control games against the best sides WITH THE BALL.
He lacks ability to forge elite midfields.
His trust in players like Rice and Dier previously in 2018 worries me. They are effective to some degree, but we need to be looking at guys who are genuine playmakers and can also defend. It should not be an either or situation, we can and must find both in one player.
He needs to be braver with subs and do it earlier. Make the most of your talented pool of players, do not just grind it out - stick your chest out, back the players in these pressure situations rather than worry about them making a mistake.
Want to know how Italians win ugly?
Italian's very rarely defend and just stay in the low block. They nearly always seek to offer something on the counter, and they also know when to step out of it and control the game if need be. They also are efficient in possession out of the low block and never just hoof it.
A big thank you for all those who have followed and retweeted our work during these Euros. The team will be taking a well-earned break and will look to come back with a bang.
Arrivederci my friends and do check out our work at:
➡️ Palmer ghosts (played in front of Ugarte/Casemiro) ➡️ Mazraoui inverting sets traps for Madueke
➡️ Hojlund made it stick too much (release earlier)
➡️ Maresca stop A team v B team
➡️ Chelsea vulnerable out wide
#CFC #MUFC
Palmer was given a free ride against Newcastle, with plenty of space to operate in.
In this game, United had two defensive minded players in midfield (but both with a tendency to leave space in behind). Palmer failed to exploit this space, dropping too deep to connect player and letting United midfield get set up.
Maresca needs to show some more balls or inventivenss here and be prepared to take Palmer off, or combine him with anoher playmaker in these type of games where he is stifled especially bigger games where space is at a premium.
He wasn't the only one. Look how much Chelsea showed a general lack of penetration with their passing, only Neto is looking to get in behind... everyone else is too close in their own half and not really looking to turn United and get right at them.
❌ Large distances in midfield (3-1-6)
❌ Lack of quality overlaps
❌ CB's either too slow or feeble
❌ CF's starved or undercooked
❌ Lack of legs/positional IQ at CDM
❌ Bruno, Rashford - Hollywood Ball
❌15 min press
A THREAD 🧵
#MUFC
How often did we see United play this absolutely moronic 3-1-6 shape in possession where there was zero relationisim in the midfield region, no chance for the deepest midfielder to find consistent options to pass it to and create some triangles... a key concept for when a team is trying to control chaos.
Eriksen, Casemiro, Mainoo... all suffered at times as the sides deepest pivot only to see their partners flying forward to pick up pockets of space with no real chance of the ball getting there and watching their team mate swarmed under pressure.
Not to mention this also left the team pretty vulnerable on the counter which we will touch upon later.
Anthony is now officially a meme and truth be told, he should shoulder some blame for that but Ten Hag hung him out to dry from a tactical point of view and he's not the only one.
Rashford has also recently begun to suffer due to Ten Hag's full back choices.
Wan Bisakka behind an inverting winger didn't make sense, hence it was Garnacho at RW which fixed this issue. He then moves Garnacho left this season, and replaces AWB with another mostly defensive full back in Mazraoui?
So where are the overlaps coming from when Dalot likes to invert? none of this is coherent or makes sense.
Ten Hag’s #MUFC tenure vs Arne Slot brief #LFC reign is a wonderful study in the importance of good coaching.
Failure to sign Zubimendi - was easy for Liverpool’s build up to take a hit and for them to lose ‘control’.
Instead Slot coaches his way out of it.
A THREAD 🧵
Ten Hag’s terrible player profiling especially in the midfield region has really haunted Manchester United during his entire reign.
The 6 region has completely baffled him on and off the ball.
Yet this is the area of the pitch where the modern coach most needs to excel in since the rise of Guardiola…
Slot you could tell from day 1 in pre season was preoccupied with getting this area of the pitch right. Whilst he was also seeking a transfer solution for this role he was nevertheless laying down ground work for the players who could compete for this area of the pitch.
5 KEY DIFFERENCES we’ve observed since Arne took the post.
A Thread 🧵
#LFC #LiverpoolFC
We touched upon this previously but it seems super fast starts to rattle the opposition are Klopp’s bread and butter whereas Slot tends to want to digest the action before unsheathing his sword…
Klopp prior to his last season and his reluctant attempt in trying to bring in Thiago aside generally used his midfield as a way of winning the ball and efficiently getting it to the flanks.
Slot likes his side to really use the midfield to build up play, his side creates more authoritative sexy passing combos in central regions of the pitch and you’re more likely to see deep lying playmakers thrive in a Slot system hence the chase for Zubimendi than in Klopp’s OG Liverpool side.
Klopp used energy of the crowd to win the first 15 minutes and ride the momentum for remainder of game whereas Slot prefers surgical approach first before loosening handbrake.
A THREAD (w Data)🧵
Due to the small sample size, we looked at Slot time with Feyenoord to see if this was a coincidence or if this is a deeper principle he has always abided by. The numbers shocked us…
Feyenoord definitely stepped it up more second half compared to first half…
We then wanted to see how prime heavy metal football compared. So we look at 2018/19.
It seems sides do increase their attack in second half, due to the need to get a result and tiring legs but what we did observe was a big difference between how intense Slot is in 2nd half.
The sale of Jaap Stam. Jaap was the world’s best centre back during the treble season but a season later he was sold (not quite in his prime but still operating at a world class level).
Early in the 2001–02 season, Stam was controversially sold to Lazio in Italy after Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson was reportedly upset by allegations Stam had made in his autobiography Head to Head about the club. Stam made numerous statements in the book about his views on opposing players, and alleged that Ferguson's approach to buy him was done without the permission of PSV. Later, Simon Kuper reported that contrary to initial belief, Ferguson had noticed that Stam's tackling numbers were declining and simply assumed the defender was past his playing peak.Laurent Blanc was signed as his replacement.
In 2007, however, Ferguson described the decision to sell Stam as an error: "At the time he had just come back from an achilles injury and we thought he had just lost a little bit. We got the offer from Lazio, £16.5m for a centre back who was 29. It was an offer I couldn't refuse. But in playing terms it was a mistake. He is still playing for Ajax at a really good level."
The sale of Eto’o and signing of Zlatan Ibrahimovic… letting go of the ideal striker for a tiki taka fluid style of play and bringing in a relatively tactically static target man type.
Ibrahimovic arrived at Barcelona when they were at the top of the mountain, and there was only one place for them to go. Yes, Barcelona won La Liga again in 2009-10 – they were one game away from an unbeaten season, only losing to Atletico Madrid – but they were to face disappointment in both the Copa del Rey, where they lost to Sevilla in the final due to away goals, and the Champions League, eliminated, famously, by Mourinho’s Inter in the semi-finals.
Ibrahimovic played sporadically, particularly by his standards; in La Liga, he was left out of the matchday squad on five occasions and was benched twice. He did not take it lying down.
The Swede later claimed that he was “a Ferrari being driven like a Fiat” in his book as he was limited to 23 league starts, and was substituted off in both legs against his old club, Inter.
He provided 34 goal involvements throughout the season, but the team simply didn’t seem to function as well with him as the focal point; Guardiola’s tiki-taka style did not require a bruising frontman, instead a light touch with flexibility and swift interchanges. Lionel Messi and Pedro were trusted to do that; it appeared that Ibrahimovic was not.