By Merlion
August 10 2015
In the pub after the 2-0 defeat by West Ham it was quite downbeat, we agreed the Hammers deserved to win, and that it had been a shambles. Cech got quite a bit of stick but we very quickly moved on to more interesting non-football issues. However Arsenal Times correspondent Merlion believes it was not a matter of a shambles, or Cech's mistakes, or madness, but the methods Wenger uses. He believes those ideas will work. his artcle follows below.
Circulation Football is a phrase coined by Rinus Michels in his classic book (2001) “Team Building – the road to success” with his own method of Dutch Total Football. Arsene Wenger had produced his version of Total Football incorporating attacking pressure football and the ‘hunt’ for the ball.
“This strategy is distinguished by the ability to circulate the ball from player to player until the correct moment arises for the attacking phase and thus, the ball can be played deep. That moment can arise very quickly, but it can also take many passes over many stations. This strategy places a high demand on the build-up qualities of the team, together with high-quality positional play. This is a tough assignment, especially if the opponents pressure you constantly.
Circulation Football is linked to two guidelines:
• It is a means to be able to play the ball deep and not an aim in itself.
• It has to be linked to a healthy dose of opportunistic football via for example, the lucky pass and the cross.”
Oxlade-Chamberlain’s goal against Chelski is the third strategy of Circulation Football – opportunism during the build-up stage. When a sudden space appears in a split-second, Oxlade-Chamberlain has the courage to seize this opportunity to strike at goal – not ‘blindly’ crossing the ball and not choose to play a square pass or a backward pass.
Against West Ham United, we failed because of our very elaborate combination plays around the box. Sometimes we succeed, but most of time we failed and laboriously struggled to score. Over-elaboration and predictable short-passing game in the box mean that we are playing Crab Football, passing around the box languidly sideways and backward. It becomes boring without too many surprises and thus is easy to defend. We exaggerated the short combinations to the extent that the opponents had ample time to organize their defence, without opportunism, i.e. lacked the surprise element.
Arsenalfailed to realise that every premiership managers knows about their short-passing circulation football; and can be easily countered by denying time and space to work on their build-up. Against West Ham United with their disciplined and well-coordinated defensive setup, the Gunners failed to perform fast combinations with excellent positional play to create more clear scoring chances than West Ham united.
We crossed the ball frequently from the flanks. It is the responsibility of the forwards and attacking midfielders to get into the box to attack these crosses; and that is why Giroud, Alexis and Ramsey are so valued with their predatory instinct to attack these crosses. Walcott’s instinct is to come in from deep and to pick-up all those loose balls but we will not find him attacking all those crosses as he lacks the knack to perform those instinctive runs of Alexis, Giroud and Ramsey into the box in anticipation of a cross.
We have been harping on far too long on the need to buy another purely defensive midfielder. But we forgot that Arsene Wenger never believe in relying on one single brilliant specialist to carry the team but rely on Total Football or the entire team to defence as a UNIT, to pressure the opponent and to hunt down the ball. We failed because as a team, we lack defensive organisation and the flexibility to be able to adapt to changing situations during the match; and why we won only 9 out of first 19 matches in 2014/15 season. It is the TEAM that loses a match, not any individual.
Within the team building process – defending, building-up and attacking – the defensive team function has the highest priority when creating the correct balance in the team. All players defend, everything is based on anti-football process, i.e. do not let the opponent get into their rhythm of play. Anti-Football is to play ruthlessly with the result taking precedent over playing beautiful football.
Why we won against Chelsea is simply this:
A well organised defensive effort performed by eleven players in a cohesive team tactical unit forms the realistic basis for controlling midfield and counter-attacking with one brilliant moment of individualism tow in the match. And protecting the narrow 1-0 win with a solid and anti-football defensive play in the 2nd half, inviting a toothless Chelsea to attack us to no avail.
Arsene Wenger in fact played anti-football to beat Chelsea with the emphasis on defensive organisation and how to eliminate their playmakers in Fabregas and Edin Hazard.
This is the new reality at Arsenal FC. You can do a good job building-up and attacking with circulation football, but if your defence is struggling, then you will always be vulnerable to swift counter-attacking plays. Sometimes you win, but mostly you lost crucial games against top sides when the defensive foundation is lacking.
Playing attacking football always goes hand-in-hand with leaving a large vacuum behind for a counter-attacking team to exploit. As shown against Chelsea, Wenger Total Football needs the entre team to defend once possession is lost.
We compensate with a “not so well organised” defence with each player having to help defensively when possession is lost, and instantly put pressure on the opponent on their own half of the pitch. Not one player can slack off. This is vitally important as we have a perchance to lose possession near out box by always passing the ball out of defence.
The reasons Arsenal were so vulnerable when playing attacking football for the past four or more seasons are simply:
• Not capable of instantly pressing their opponent when possession is lost during counter-attacking.
• Not capable of instantly pressing their opponent on our own half of the pitch when a pass is intercepted.
• Ball was often lost in midfield compounded with lacking attacking midfielders who were goal scorers.
• Team did not possess good man-to-man markers or players who will fight and win the ball in the middle.
• Lack of coherence and coordination between Defence and Midfield, i.e. both poorly organised.
The main reason why we will have a successful season is Arsene Wenger had completed the team building process, instilled the winning mentality into them and mentally strong against ups and downs as expected throughout the season. I believe this 2015/16 squad are winners with this kind of togetherness and match mentality:
• Conviction and willingness to be a winner;
• Courage, self-confidence and controlled fear to lose;
• Controlled aggressiveness, stamina and physical fitness;
• Ability to handle losing;
• Take and demand responsibility;
• Team discipline and team spirit;
• Responsibility for the team.
Mesut Ozil is a creative playmaker and was given free rein upfront and finally rotated back to the central zone where he is best. He has overcome his “controlled fear to lose” by taking up more responsibility to get into shooting position, and to shoot instead of being too scared to shoot or elect to perform a square pass. Partly due to Wenger’s coaching and partly due to the solidarity of the players, Ozil will have the confidence to become a “leader” and will not shirk his responsibility this season.
But Ozil will not be at his best without the “controlled aggressiveness, stamina and ball-winning” ability of Coquelin, Cazorla and Ramsey playing behind him. We need their stamina to protect the flanks as well when Wenger Total Football is based on our attacking half-backs to stretch the opponents.
We have better team coherence now, players able to play disciplined combination play. Giroud, Alexis, Walcott and Oxlade-Chamberlain are playing with support from attacking midfielders, with plenty and continual inter-changing positional plays amongst forwards and attacking midfielders with support from deep-lying central midfielders like Ozil, Ramsey, Cazorla and even Coquelin driving into the box to support attacking plays.
This season, we should see an improvement in the coordination between our attacking wing-backs down the flanks with the secondary defensive midfield line in Cazorla-Coquelin-Ramsey (or Oxlade-Chamberlain) protecting the space left behind. Plus Aaron Ramsey is improving on his long ball delivery with better understanding of the timing of the runs by forwards and outside attackers.
The team-work and willingness of these Forward-3 in Alexis-Giroud-OX or Alexis-Walcott-OX to gear their actions to one and another to serve the team will be the key to our success to unlock ’10-man defence’ in the box.
There is harmony within the squad, friends on and off the field, and Arsene Wenger described this harmony as “We now have the stability that gives us strength. … We have a good cohesive group with the ability to do better.”
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