champions league performances - tactically unsophisticated

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blue city199

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I know Patrice evra is a rag but he makes a good point about English teams in Europe . To his credit he also says rags could have won more in Europe if rednose had any tactical nous.
http://www.fourfourtwo.com/news/im-worried-about-english-football-evra#iPRfkOmrMP7vr2WO.99
'I'm worried about English football' - Evra

Former Manchester United defender Patrice Evra says English clubs are tactically inferior to their European rivals.

Patrice Evra says English clubs struggle in Europe due to a lack of tactical sophistication and claims he was not worried when Juventus faced Manchester City in the Champions League.

The French full-back spent eight years in England with Manchester United, winning the Champions League and reaching the final twice.

He left Old Trafford for Juve in July 2014, winning Serie A in his first season and appearing in another European final, losing the tournament's decider to personal nemeses Barcelona for the third time in his career.

After strong continental showings between 2005 and 2011, Premier League clubs have struggled to make an impact in recent years.

And Evra has told the Sunday Times he believes English teams are not preparing thoroughly enough to be successful in the Champions League.

"I'm a little bit worried about English football," he said.

"Why? In Europe, being fast, being strong, playing only with your quality, you are going to struggle against teams that prepare. That is where England has to work, it is about tactics. But it is not easy, because the players won't accept it.

"When Juventus played Manchester City … I was not worried," he added, referring to a clash the Italian side won 2-1 at the Eithad Stadium in September.

The 34-year-old also claimed he was surprised to discover how strategic the approach to winning is in Italy, something he feels could have been of benefit to United even as they collected an extraordinary haul of silverware under former manager Alex Ferguson.

"I learnt a lot about a way to be more professional - even if I was already a massive professional in Manchester," he said.

"I was sometimes thinking, 'You win a lot of trophies for Manchester but you could have done much more if you had known the more cultured European way to play.'

"The Premier League is like two boxers fighting. The one who is least strong gets tired, he goes down. Here it is like a chess game and you have to understand every move before you play with your quality, your strength, your skill. That's the difference."
 
I don't see how or why they are like this though.

Take us for example, the vast majority of our players have come from other, more "tactically superior" leagues. Our manager has coached for many years in Spain, as has his assistant. Our footballing director came from FC Barcelona. Why are we much different then to other teams in Europe? Is is the calibre and type of opponents we generally face week in week out that leaves us under prepared?
 
We do have some tricks to learn that's for sure. Juve killed that game stone dead at 2-1 up. It was a master class in how to waste time until the final whistle.
 
ws01 said:
I don't see how or why they are like this though.

Take us for example, the vast majority of our players have come from other, more "tactically superior" leagues. Our manager has coached for many years in Spain, as has his assistant. Our footballing director came from FC Barcelona. Why are we much different then to other teams in Europe? Is is the calibre and type of opponents we generally face week in week out that leaves us under prepared?
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Exactly. If it's just a question of tactics, then how come Ancelotti and Mourinho can't do it with an English club but can in every other country? How come Roberto Di Matteo and Rafa Benitez can win it with teams that are clearly not the most talented in the competition?

It's a cup competition, so there's always an element of luck involved, especially with similarly matched sides. But in general, the countries with the better teams do better on average. The reason why English clubs haven't done well in the past few years is because they haven't had great teams. Between 2005 and 2009, we had 6 out of the 10 finalists. Since then, we've had just one finalist, because we haven't had teams that are as good as Barca, Real, Bayern, etc. Since then, Chelsea suffered a slump in quality (although ironically won the CL with a far worse team than their best), Arsenal sold their best players every season for years, and are only now getting back to where they were, Liverpool have completely dropped off the map as a Premier League force, and the rags have sold world class players, had world class players retire, and have failed to replace them.

We've struggled to get to grips with the competition for a number of reasons. We're quite unique in being one of the only teams in history to be a massive scalp before we've even played a game in the competition. We've also been incredibly unlucky with draws (well not unlucky, it's designed that way), going up against the best Bayern team ever, the best Dortmund team for decades, the best Barcelona team ever... We've also failed to be organised enough defensively in the league, never mind the CL, so it's not a massive surprise to see that against better teams in a knock out competition, that becomes a problem. Hopefully we've addressed that somewhat this season.
 
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It's hard for PL clubs but the biggest factor for me is the physicality, in the Champions League, every tackle is a yellow card, it's a competition ridden with diving and play acting, whereas in the PL 50/50 tackles are allowed, it's a completely different style too. Look at how many red cards we've been given for fairly innocuous challenges, it's borderline ridiculous.

I believe it's a bit too fanciful to just use tactics, as look at the calibre of managers we've had over here. I doubt any of them are tactically naive enough, or the players unprofessional enough to deny their managers.
 
I've always had the sense that tactics in Italy come higher up the footballing values scale than in England. Whether that applies to continental football in general, I'm not sure.
 
What a load of bollocks. The English league is tough and the number of games, with cup competitions makes it very hard to succeed domestically and in Europe. Generally a club suffers in one or both. No winter break doesn't help either. The other European sides are rested and come back for the CL knockouts fresh, we go into them after a heavy run of fixtures and the third round of the FA Cup. And then League Cup semi's are played as well... Juve generally can coast domestically and prioritise Europe. So can Spanish teams. It's so much easier for them and then they can keep up their performance levels.

The prem has weakened in quality slightly and become more competitive but I do not believe we're tactically weaker than anywhere else.
 
The PL is just crash bang wallop shite. Players get used to playing that way and then find it harder to readapt to playing Euro football 6 times in autumn and winter.

PL teams are getting humped by Swiss clubs and struggling all over Europe. Italian and Spanish teams are light years ahead including the smaller clubs.
 
Millwallawayveteran1988 said:
We do have some tricks to learn that's for sure. Juve killed that game stone dead at 2-1 up. It was a master class in how to waste time until the final whistle.
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That's exactly what happened. MP should have shut up shop at 1-0 and said try and break us down. But hey ho, all part of the roller coaster ride.
 
supercity88 said:
What a load of bollocks. The English league is tough and the number of games, with cup competitions makes it very hard to succeed domestically and in Europe. Generally a club suffers in one or both. No winter break doesn't help either. The other European sides are rested and come back for the CL knockouts fresh, we go into them after a heavy run of fixtures and the third round of the FA Cup. And then League Cup semi's are played as well... Juve generally can coast domestically and prioritise Europe. So can Spanish teams. It's so much easier for them and then they can keep up their performance levels.

The prem has weakened in quality slightly and become more competitive but I do not believe we're tactically weaker than anywhere else.
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it's not bollocks at all, English teams have always looked tactically inferior.
 
I feel the exact same way, it is quite bizarre how exposed English teams are in Europe quite frequently, both Europa and CL.

We have some of the best players in the world playing in the Premier league, we have some and have had plenty of top managers and players before them also yet we continually look under prepared in nearly every game.
 
city saint said:
why though with continental managers and players,surely they don't suddenly forget everything when they move to england
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nope, i doubt they forget everything but the style in which the premier league is played, which is undeniably different to Italy for example, demands that these european players play in an 'english way' every week and so to simply adjust out of that for the odd european game is not really possible. they are habituated to the PL way.
 
"In Europe, being fast, being strong, playing only with your quality, you are going to struggle against teams that prepare."

This has always been the case with City in Europe, and it is apparent also in the PL. Unless we have a back four on the top of their game and communicating well we are prone to finding that quite ordinary teams have the answer to possession football and can frustrate for long periods. They only need a defensive cock up or a ref ready to point to the spot for a soft 'un and the game's gone.

It's something that most City fans acknowledge. I've said it before on this forum that I think Pellers relies more on the quality in the team than on finding out the Achilles heel of the opposition. I bet Sevilla have watched every game since we played them last!
 
shemnel said:
it's not bollocks at all, English teams have always looked tactically inferior.
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It is bollocks. Arsenal beat Bayern last week. Were they tactically inferior? Was that just luck? Do better players have any impact on results? What about fatigue? Injuries? Pellegrini has masterminded much worse sides than ours far in the competition. He happened to get knocked out by Arsenal I recall... was he tactically outclassed? Chelsea won it by sitting deep and playing on the counter, are you telling me that's tactical sophistication?


We didn't take our chances against Juve. It's actually the game we deserved to win most so far this season in the CL. If their tactical masterplan was to let us have most of the ball and create a lot of chances then they 100% pulled it off. They took their chances and played on the counter. But that's the way most teams will have to play against us because we are better than most in possession. It's how West Ham beat us, it's how Norwich tried to beat us. It's how we would try and beat Bayern and Barca. That's not tactical sophistication. It's recognising your strengths and weaknesses and playing accordingly. We play a more expansive game at home and we generally try to keep things tighter away from home.

In Pellegrini and Wenger what you do have is two managers that like to play attacking football and like to win games. We've shown a bit more nous this season. We've made defensive changes and closed games out. Depsite Evra's comments about English football being a boxing match with the fittest fighter winning, we've won two CL games late on - is that because of our fitness?! Arsenal were foolish against Olympiakos - they should have seen out that game and won it. But I don't believe there's a huge gulf in tactical awareness.

Juve's style means they're never going to be out of sight. They can defend well for 90mins and maybe score the odd goal but a good spell from the opposition and they're right back in it. If we played a two legged tie against them at some stage we'd take our chances. Sitting back and defending and playing on the counter doesn't always get you the result. More often than not you have a lapse in concentration and concede. There have been very few sides that have won the CL playing that way. Inter and Chelsea the two I can recall. More often than not, it's the team that plays good attacking football that wins.
 
Here's a list of the last 11 CL finals (winners written first)

Barca - Juve
Real - Atletico
Bayern - Dortmund
Chelsea - Bayern
Barca - Rags
Inter - Bayern
Barca - Rags
Rags - Chelsea
Milan - Liverpool
Barca - Arsenal
Liverpool - Milan

Plenty of English clubs in and around there. We don't give a shit about the Europa. That's not tactics. It's largely players being rested and a lack of commitment to winning it. The league takes priority. That's different on the continent where they take European competitions very seriously. Winning the CL is so big, most Real/Barca fans would probably prefer to win it over La Liga if they couldn't win both. Again, in England we'd rather win the league. There haven't been many English sides to win the league and CL in the same season... the tough season makes it very hard. It's not tactics at all or we wouldn't see so much success from English teams in the competition.

The reason things aren't so good recently is because of the quality. We've always had the ability to implode and we've struggled for form in Europe. We've still beaten Bayern and Roma last season when we had to. The Roma win was a great tactical win in my opinion. The quality of English sides isn't amazing. You can pick weaknesses in most. Arsenal lack a start centre forward and central defensive reinforcements. The rags lack goals, but tactically they're hard to beat at the moment. Chelsea look very good on paper but god knows what's going on there. The media are making a bigger issue out of tactics than there is. The quality is slightly lacking but I don't think we're far off being a very good side in Europe. This season we're showing an ability to grind out results and a bit more defensive nous when required.
 
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