Sakho, Luiz, Carragher & Neville and England's Naivety

Last night’s Sky Sports’ Monday Night Football generated another intriguing discussion from pundits Jamie Carragher and Gary Neville. The pair looked back at David Luiz’s performance against Everton on Saturday evening and, the usually insightful Carragher in particular, heavily criticised the Brazilian. His scathing attack on Luiz exposed a stale, cement-minded English footballing mentality, which has seen the Three Lions win just one major international competition since inventing the game themselves over a century ago.

Neville, on the other hand, at least attempted to battle with his stoically British brain, asking, “If our way is right, why are we not winning anything?” The alarmingly rat-faced ex-Manchester United defender’s effort to oppose his counterpart’s tired, English outlook, meant I found myself (reluctantly) siding with him.

So let’s get onto the subject of their argument.

As I said, they were looking back at David Luiz’s performance for Chelsea at the weekend. His attempt to win the ball from Ross Barkley on the edge of the penalty area, resulted in him neglecting his duty of picking up Steven Naismith, who was unmarked a yard from the goal, and subsequently headed home when the cross came in to put Everton ahead. A glaring mistake, right? Well, before you mock Luiz and class him, so easily, as a ‘headless chicken’, think of what he, and his foreign colleagues with the same philosophy, have won in recent years. Based on that, the ‘wrong’ way could be right after all.

Aggressive defender, Mamadou Sakho, made his Liverpool debut on
Monday night at Swansea.

On his Liverpool debut last night, centre-back Mamadou Sakho portrayed a similarly aggressive mind-set to that of David Luiz. The Frenchman was intent on winning the ball early and high-up the pitch from Swansea’s forwards and refused to sit in a deep, compact shape. Like Luiz, Sakho will make mistakes defending in this manner: so should this mould of centre-half revert to being more restrained defensively? Absolutely not. A more negative defender will make just as many errors, but they will be less noticeable.

The advantages and disadvantages of passing out from the back can provoke a similarly oscillating debate. Again, it is the English who, predominantly, support the more conservative and straightforward view: when under pressure, clear the ball long, and rely on physicality to win football matches. This antiquated logic has seen England win nothing in the last 47 years, despite continuously having a crop of talented players, while the technical and tactical advancement of other countries has continuously caused us to fall further behind internationally.

So if I must delve into it, who is right: us or them?

I’ll use a hypothetical example to try to state my opinion on ball retention (or lack of it) at the back. Your team are drawing nil-nil and the defenders and goalkeeper are passing between themselves until an opportunity arises to supply an accurate pass to someone further forward. Suddenly, the opposition’s striker intercepts the ball as it is travelling from one central defender to the other, and, with just your goalkeeper to beat, he places the ball neatly in the bottom corner of the net. It’s nil-one. Who’s to blame? It’s obvious isn’t it: the centre-back’s whose pass was intercepted to set up the goal. Blame the manager too – why not?! He shouldn’t be encouraging passing amongst defenders, should he?

Now for another hypothetical situation. Rewind. Your team is in possession again, the score is nil-nil, and that nonsensical passing at the back has not happened – thank god. This time, when in possession, your centre-back makes a hopeful, aerial clearance to the opposing defensive third. The ball bounces into the arms of the other team’s goalkeeper and he rolls it out to one of his team-mates. Five minutes later, after slowly advancing up the pitch as a unit, the opposition’s central midfielder smashes in a sublime, unstoppable shot into the top corner of your team’s net from 30 yards. This time your players are blameless, aren’t they? You’ve just got to take your hat off to the goal-scorer for a stunning strike, surely?

No, of course not.

Remember that defender I told you about who ‘naively’ attempted a short pass in defence, and subsequently gifted the ball to the opposing striker who put your team one-nil down? Well the outcome is the same in the second hypothetical situation: concession of a goal and your team is behind. So that defender’s optimistic punt down-field was just as costly as a slack, short pass in defence, albeit with not as unequivocal and immediate effect. Therefore, long clearances can be just as damaging to a team as patient passing in defence; just because a mistake is less obvious, doesn't make its expense diminish.

Fundamentally, in my opinion, the key to a successful and stylish football team, is to be just as courageous in possession (passing decisions) as you are without the ball (tackles and aerial duels).

I want to leave you with this typically English quote from Roy Hodgson after our goalless draw in Ukraine last week: "We didn't want to play out from the back and invite pressure." If you have read any of this piece, you should be able to fathom why what he said stoked my antipathy towards Roy’s style of management. Unfortunately his footballing ideas are widespread across the country, and that unfortunately, as I touched on earlier, is why England are further from winning an international tournament than ever.