Number 10s and binary in modern football...

Kevin Phillips: A REAL number 10

Over the past couple of years a new phenomenon has been born; the Number 10 Role.

What used to be known as playing in the hole, or playing off or behind the striker, or even a free role, is now playing as a number 10, and it winds me up something chronic.

Football is a game that when played at its best is fluid and interchangeable, naming a position after a number doesn’t fit with that notion at all.

Even at the age of 22 my view on squad numbers appears to be a very traditional one, because nowadays nobody plays flat 4-4-2 formations.

A mere decade ago, your goalkeeper would wear 1, your fullbacks 2 and 3, and the central defenders 5 and 6. Midfielders would wear 7, 4, 8 and 11 from right to left, and your little striker would have 10 to your big guy’s 9. Simple.

When I envisage an archetypal number 10, I think Michael Owen alongside Emile Heskey, or Kevin Phillips partnered by Niall Quinn.  

Even though there was an accepted format, numbers never labelled the positions, and with squad numbers being issued in league football, teams rarely lined up with 1-11 on the field, let alone in these exact positions.

In 2014, 4-4-2 is all but dead, and there is an ever increasing reliance on the central play maker; the number 10.

Gary Neville has been quoted as saying that in the modern game everyone wants to be a number 10, and that is at the detriment of defending, but as far as I can tell it still doesn’t mean anything. Is football turning into rugby?

Rugby is a sport where the 15 selected players wear numbers 1-15 and the numbers refer to a specific position in the team. One of the positions is actually named after the number, and the number eight is a globally recognised term.

The difference that still exists in football, despite the death of 4-4-2, is that the manager is entitled to play a number of different formations, meaning that numbers cannot equate to positions.

Louis Van Gaal, the new Manchester United manager, is a fan of 3-5-2 or 3-4-1-2, and this means some of the positions I labelled with numbers above don’t even exist.

Despite the fact Van Gaal favours a formation that fans in English football are not used to watching, it hasn’t stopped him describing positions as numbers.

"Rooney can play at 10 and nine. He said to me he can also play 7 and 11. But I like him more at 9 or 10. Kagawa was a number 10 at Dortmund but I want to try him at number 6 and number 8."

What?

It would appear that Van Gaal is now conversing predominantly in numbers, and I have no idea what the future holds for Kagawa. Even if we have come to (begrudgingly) accept number 10 into the games vocabulary, I have genuinely no idea where a 6 plays, and god help all of us if he fancies the Spain-inspired false-9 formation any time soon.

In terms of insight, the Dutchman may as well be speaking in binary, and I’m pretty sure Seven-11 is a convenience store chain, so maybe he’s got Rooney doing the lunch run…

Richard's Alternative World Cup Awards

Miroslav Klose lifts the World Cup

The global gaze has been removed from Brazil, the wall charts are down and the Germans are celebrating. The World Cup is definitely over.

Ten days has been plenty of time for reflection, and all of the serious (and in many cases predictably repetitive) conclusions have been formed, so now it’s time for a few alternative impressions.

The decision to award Lionel Messi the Golden Ball for player of the tournament was one that ridiculed the process; several less high-profile talents eclipsed him.

The only positive I can see from giving that particularly accolade to the man that has won and earned so much is that he happened to be there to collect it… how practical.

As follows are what will soon be globally known as Richard’s Alternative World Cup Awards.

Player who looks least like a footballer

Sometimes you see someone on the pitch and find yourself thinking they look completely out of place. For example, for a few years I’ve been unable to shake the theory that Matt Jarvis should commute on a train and work in London’s financial district. The World Cup threw up a few similar theories of identity crises. Christian Noboa did a passable impression of Coronation Street legend Ena Sharples, managing to confuse a friend of mine in the process. 

Can't decide what I'm more concerned about creeping into football - biting or hairnets? #EnaSharples #EcuvFra
— Grant Yardley (@GJYardley) June 25, 2014

Similarly, much maligned Brazilian forward Fred seemed to belong on the set of a pre-war silent movie. He can’t be any worse at tying distressed damsels to railway lines than he is at posing a threat to opposing defences. The winner though is a sign of the times. In an age where so-called reality television makes a celebrity out of someone who would appear to live a purposeless existence, Sergio Romero has a career beyond football. I have absolutely no doubt that the Argentina goalkeeper would be right at home in Made in Buenos Aires. 

I can't shake the feeling this man owns many mirrors

Worst attempt at foreign pronunciation

The World Cup can be a minefield of names that we haven’t seen before, let alone attempted to say. The task of tackling names like Reza Ghoochannejhad and Jose Pedro Fuenzalida is made all the more complicated when Tim Vickery exists to add unnecessary and inexplicable accents and nuances to every South American name. Apparently Fred is to be pronounced “Frejji”.

The hot topic of this World Cup was the pronunciation of James Rodriguez’ name. The recently transferred Real Madrid player was the Golden Boot winner and therefore remained prominent in discussions throughout. It would appear that James is pronounced Ham-ez, this was not for Glenn Hoddle, who simply referred to him as ‘the boy James’.

It is for something else entirely that Glenn wins this award though; his attempt at saying Algeria was somewhat below par. A course mate of mine, who will remain nameless to save embarrassment, thought that Al Jazeera was the chap who starred in the Godfather; Glenn Hoddle thinks it’s a North African country. Inspiration from the man Ian Wright insists on calling gaffer.

Those Al Jazeerans pushed Germany all the way...

Most disdainful Description of FIFA

This is not an easy award to hand out, because frankly there is nothing nice to say about this particular organisation. Shameless and lacking all morality, they would appear to be void of all perspective. Congratulations Sepp, you’re legacy is assured.

The winner in this category though is John Oliver. A Brit in America, Oliver gave himself the task of explaining to his US audience exactly what it is about FIFA that all football fans find hideous. The result was an approximately 12 minute long tirade that could hardly be argued with and began with the headline: “FIFA is a comically grotesque organisation.” Well said.

Biggest Waste of Money

The Arena Amazonia hosted four games in the World Cup.

As the name suggests, the stadium was by far the most remote of the venues, in the city of Manaus, it could almost be described as the heart of the Amazon rainforest.

The city itself is by no means uncivilised, but it is cut-off from the rest of the country and access by road is almost impossible. Many of the materials used to build the venue had to be shipped down the Amazon River, and the cost of construction was $270 million. When you consider the remote location and the fact only four games were played there, in an energy-sapping humidity that was barely suitable for football, it begins to look like a questionable outlay.

The story only gets bleaker when the legacy of the stadium is considered. Nacional Futebol Clube will move in as tenants, but they’re used to a far inferior capacity ground, and simply don’t have the following to fill the ground. Wikipedia doesn’t seem to know much about Nacional, so frankly, what can there be to know.

In the video above John Oliver describes its future role as that of the “World’s most expensive bird toilet”, he’s probably not far wrong.

I forgot to mention the pitch... they messed that up too!

Most ridiculous lack of discipline

The fact that I can even consider awarding this to anyone other than Luis Suarez speaks volumes. For a man to bite an opponent and not win this title is a slightly strange one, but I see your tendency to nibble on the opposition Luis, and I raise you Cameroon.

Some members of the Ghana squad literally fought to take the title, but Alex Song’s dismissal against Croatia took the biscuit. I was almost relieved to hear there was suspicious betting patterns surrounding that particular fixture, because there was no reason to do what he did, it was utterly ridiculous.

While there hasn’t been any confirmation regarding guilt or sanctions I’ll allow the rest of the squad to share the award too, with a hat-tip in the direction of Benoit Assou-Ekotto who decided he’d rather fight a teammate than focus his energy on beating the other team at football. Priorities.

Hold your head... Or better still explain yourself

#WestCountryRevisited

The weather wasn't this nice in the days leading up to the game... 

“There you go… that’s England’s green and pleasant land.”

As Grant looked up from his crossword book to caption the scenery on the return train journey to Gloucester for #WestCountryRevisited, his description was accurate but had to be responded to with a certain amount of disdain.

I’m always in favour of references to Jerusalem the almost-official anthem of English cricket, but it’s dangerous if he gets too comfortable in his familiar surroundings, so I simply chose to point out that Essex is pretty green too.

It was with Essex in mind that I made the return journey, with a T20 fixture to see at the fabled Cheltenham festival, the less said about the result though, the better.

As Gloucestershire’s Chris Dent, AKA The Dentist, hit the winning runs, a grinning Grant stood up, offered his hand and said that’s one each… he was forgetting the second game Essex had won against them this year, but he was close enough, and there’s still one more match to go this season back at fortress Chelmsford.

Following up on my March trip to Meadow Park and Whaddon Road, there were more of the West Country’s delights to sample this time.

I sat and had a drink adjacent to what is apparently the longest village green in England, and despite the fact that building a road through the middle of it makes it wholly unsuitable for cricket, the locals aren’t concerned… we’ll just change the rules, they thought. 

WE also took the trip into the heart of the Forest of Dean for another of Gloucester City’s ‘home’ matches, a friendly against Newport County.

Fair advance warnings were delivered about the Forest of Dean and while I didn’t witness any webbed feet, it was an experience nonetheless.

Just as Grant’s dad was explaining that the wild boar that roam the land were getting out of hand and there was talk of a cull, we passed a dead one in the road, and an age-old forest proverb was born as I attempted to describe the scene.

Wild boar, roam no more.

Poetry.

Cinderford Town was the host for the game, and in those 90 minutes we experienced torrential rain, gusting wind and bright sunshine, a veritable smorgasbord of weather that would have had Tomasz Schafernaker licking his lips.

The game itself was a standard pre-season affair, though two travelling fans attempted to spoil it from the row behind by providing insight and commentary that made Danny Murphy sound like a combination of a tactical genius on a level above Mourinho and William Shakespeare’s true linguistic heir, all in one go. Painful.

If one image could sum up that journey though it would be the one that I’ll forever struggle to shake.

As we were descending back towards civilisation we passed a lamppost with a unique decoration. Lara Croft.

Gun drawn and ready for action, the life size Lara (waxwork/dummy/doll?) was tied to the unsuspecting street light by a bike lock, and she looked like she was there for the long haul.

The thunderstorms followed me west, so while the east of the country was recovering from Thursday night’s mayhem, I was reliving it in the ‘Shire, apart from that though, another splendid trip.

World Cup post-mortems and misery

You look like I feel Roy...

When the draw was made, placing England in a tough World Cup group, qualification was by no means guaranteed.

When England lost their opening game everyone predicted they would get through the group.

When England lost their second game it was widely criticised as another terrible display by England at a major tournament, and when a few days later it was confirmed they were out, the post-mortems began.

These post-mortems, analyses and what essentially became a list of reasons we will forever be terrible at football, got exceedingly boring, exceedingly quickly, but that hasn’t stopped the end of the tournament bringing about even more of them.

All of them unoriginal, many of them unquestionably tedious, and plenty of them complete nonsense; and yet there they are.

People producing opinion as if it is fact is frustrating enough, but when there is an unspoken consensus of doom it is even harder to stomach.

Many criticisms are thrown at the English media, and focusing specifically on the sporting front, accusations of discrimination and bullying are often wrong.

For example, continually printing that Luis Suarez has been involved in another controversy is not motivated by racism or xenophobia, it is motivated by the fact Mr Suarez HAS been involved in yet another controversy.

The same goes for dear Sepp Blatter suggesting that our media is racist for reporting match fixing or corruption, no, wrong again, match fixing and corruption has to be highlighted by someone Sepp, otherwise what’s left of football’s integrity, after you’ve sold most of it in sponsorship deals, will disappear quicker than you can say ‘I’ve always been in favour of this goal line technology thing’.

One criticism that can’t be easily refuted is the tendency to be repetitive and unoriginal in the coverage of the England football team.

There will always be predictions of the team heading in to future tournaments, and they will always be highly speculative, and ultimately unhelpful and/or wrong.

So while the established press focus on why England still won’t win in Russia in 2018, It may actually be up to me, arguably the most miserable person in the universe, to provide some much needed light-heartedness.

Monday: Richard’s Alternative World Cup Awards (No sponsors have influenced final decisions)