Champions League Final 2011: Barcelona vs United.

Barcelona approach the Champions League final with almost acute tactical certainty and will undoubtedly adopt their de-facto 4-3-3 formation, or closer to a 3-2-2-1-2, in terms of average positions. Moreover, nine players are certain starters for the Catalan club: Valdes, Alves, Pique, Busquets, Xavi, Iniesta, Pedro, Villa and Messi. Indeed, it would be ten, had Carlos Puyol not spent much of the season side-lined and perhaps a full eleven, were it not for Eric Abidal having a tumour removed from his liver just two months ago.

Guardiola has two decisions to make in personal: left-back and centre-back.

Carlos Puyol is traditionally preferred at centre-back, but it seems increasingly plausible that Javier Mascherano will be utilised there by Guardiola. The Argentinian defensive-midfielder has, as yet, been unable to thrive in the engine room of the Catalan team, but has shown an ability to stick aggressively to the tasks required at the heart of the defence – he played there against Real Madrid in the semi-final.

The player Guardiola chooses alongside Pique at centre-back is unlikely to be one that affects the dynamic of the team, but the decision at left-back may well do: it could determine David Villa and Pedro’s nominal starting positions.

Should Guardiola prioritise his team’s attacking play over their defensive, it is likely he will select one from Abidal, Adriano or Maxwell, since their greater propensity to overlap would assist David Villa, most comfortable cutting inside onto his right foot when played from the left – the space would be useful to him. Pedro, by comparison, is far more the traditional winger and operates as such, whichever the flank.

Whilst, if Puyol or Mascherano start at left-back, it is possible Villa and Pedro could trade flanks for the kick-off. Of course, Barcelona’s front players will continually revolve into different positions, seeking to befuddle the opposition with movement. The system and style is second-nature to Barcelona, but an attacking challenge for them on Saturday will be to ensure they have players able to get around both sides of United’s defence.

Although regardless of fine-tuning, with the brilliance of Messi, Xavi and Iniesta whirling perpetually around the central attacking third and a one-man right-flank in Dani Alves, the questions this Barcelona pose are harder to solve than those from any other team for almost twenty years.

While, the left-hand side of Barcelona’s team may be the only decisive question they have to answer, trying to establish Manchester United’s eleven and formation is a far more convoluted process. The only en bloc certainty is that United will start with a back five, comprised of Van der Sar, Evra, Ferdinand and Vidic, for four; Rafael and Fabio the choices at right-back.

Sir Alex Ferguson has seemed unwilling to commit to a first eleven all season, or more specifically, he does not have a first eleven. The club does not exist on an ideologue like their Catalan counterparts, despite a long-held affection for 4-4-2, something that the manager shares.

The Scot has shuffled his pack all season, seeking to ensure that players do not reach levels of exhaustion, but also so that the squad remain involved. However, it has also been useful in ensuring that opposition managers remain uncertain in the tactics or players they may face and this is likely to include Guardiola.

Although United’s performance against Chelsea set a high benchmark for the use of a 4-4-2 - with Hernandez and Rooney starting together upfront - Barcelona are a different proposition, they lack a player as immobile as Frank Lampard, most pointedly. A centre midfield of Ryan Giggs and Michael Carrick versus one consisting of Busquets, Xavi and Iniesta would seem to be a catch-weight contest.

United’s manager has inferred that he possesses an answer to the Barcelona conundrum [having learned in Rome]. It seems most likely that this would involve utilising two players in the central area, both of whom would have the energy to press consistently, but also the capacity to cover ground at pace; although, intelligence and selflessness will also be required.

Two players stand-out for United in successfully rebuffing the Barcelona carousel before it reaches the defence: Darren Fletcher and Ji-Sung Park.

A United central midfield of Fletcher and Park would lack the metronomic guidance of a Carrick or Scholes, but it would enable the manager to protect their penalty area with greater surety than in Rome 2009, to keep the final third more secure, providing a stronger platform for a front four.

Unfortunately for Darren Fletcher, though, the final may have come 180 minutes too soon after his absence with a virus; the choice will revert to Michael Carrick or Ryan Giggs, with Fabio Da Silva an outsider. Should Carrick be selected, then Giggs would likely play from a deep, tucked-in left-wing position, supplementing the centre of midfield when required.

With the searing pace and virtuoso movement of Hernandez stretching the play and occupying two of the Barcelona backline; and Rooney augmenting the midfield, it feels possible that a 4-4-2 could work for United, but it would have to be pitch-perfect.

However, should the United manager seek to integrate Hernandez with pragmatism his overwhelming philosophy, then the formation would probably be the same as that in Rome 2009 - a 4-3-3 and it would mean a return to the left-hand side for Wayne Rooney.

Thus far, Rooney has been unable to interpret the left-sided forward position with the same vitality as other players with far less ability. Rather than supplementing the attack, Rooney has almost always morphed into an auxiliary left-back. Moreover, with Dani Alves the opponent for all along that flank, the fear must be that United’s best attacking player could be rendered irrelevant by his defensive responsibilities.

In many ways, though, a 4-3-3 would suit the United team: enabling Carrick to play more of a natural game to him, aided by the energy of Park and with a Giggs, Anderson or a Fabio able to break the lines with the ball at their feet.

Indeed, were United to line-up as: Van der Sar; Rafael, Ferdinand, Vidic, Evra; Valenca, Carrick, Park, Giggs; Rooney and Hernandez – they would able to change between two systems to suit the progression of the game. Tactical flexibility is likely to be high on the United manager’s agenda.

Of course, the 4-3-3 was also the system utilised by United last year and that team’s experiences will inevitably be utmost in their manager’s mind. With Rooney playing as a lone centre-forward, United obliterated Milan over two-legs and the team’s ultimate defeat to Bayern Munich owed much to the naivety of their full-back Rafael in the 2^nd-leg; until the sending-off, United had blown into a 3-0 lead.

Although Rooney has evolved into a more creative role this season, when deployed as a lone striker last year, the player’s selflessness, strength, vision, awareness and work-rate set him above any other forward in the world – Torres, Ronaldo, Drogba et al – aside from one: Messi. Though, his counterpart at Barcelona interprets the role differently.  

Moreover, Rooney’s relationship with Antonio Valencia just seemed to guarantee goals, and coincidentally, while the United number 10 has been adorned with a stylistically inaccurate nickname of the “White Pele,” it would be far more appropriate to compare Valencia with Garrincha. The Ecuadorian is all right-foot, selflessness, strength and pace; his only concern is to hit the by-line and how to get his cross in; unafraid to stop, to turn, and to run at his full-back again - much like the “Little Bird.”

With Hernandez a perfect option from the bench, ready for when the Barcelona team start to tire from 65 minutes onwards, the reversion to the relative security of 4-5-Rooney/ 4-3-3 must be attractive. Although the Nani of recent months differs from the left-sided version that played against Bayern and also the right-sided one during much of this season. It is difficult to judge the player's state of mind.

But the temptation to shell the Little Pea from kick-off might be too tantalising and seeing Hernandez’s name in the starting eleven is a prospect that might have more than just Sir Alex Ferguson salivating: United’s fans will be hoping for as much offensive bravura as is practicable.

Nowhere loves to think it walks the talk more than Manchester and attacking one of the best teams ever, whilst the eyes of the world are watching, may be as swaggering as it is possible for football tactics to become.

In Arsene we trust

In Arsene we trust: a divisive phrase amongst Arsenal fans and one that will forever be laced with a withering inference; those who imbibe the credo and use it without irony are simply unable to question Arsene Wenger, just happy to bury their head in the sand like many a pious fundamentalist, at least that is the view of many Arsenal fans. This summer could see the phrase being used with increasing sarcasm, by increasing numbers, if recent weeks are anything to go by.

Arsenal’s season has been one of peaks and troughs: the progression of Jack Wilshere undermined by the Don Balon debacle with Cesc Fabregas; the continued brilliance and goals of Robin Van Persie diluted by his consistently glassy physique; the heights hit by Samir Nasri for two-thirds of the season eroded by his mediocre final one-third; a one-off defeat of Barcelona ultimately proving irrelevant as the club were put in their place during the return leg. Above all else, though, Arsenal failed to win a trophy, flopping in the League and both the domestic Cups; the club have not won a trophy since 2005.

But, of course, Football Managers exist in a shade of grey and if viewed through a prism of transfer expenditure alone, Arsene Wenger has punched far beyond his weight-class: Arsenal stand 19^th out of the current 20 Premier League clubs for total net expenditure, trading at a profit in player recruitment, for the period 2006-2011. Pound–for-pound sterling, Wenger’s record bears comparison with any.

However, in electing to regrow an already established club from its roots - accentuating Arsenal in their entirety towards youth and imposing a specific playing ideologue - Wenger unilaterally instigated an initiative so challenging that he must have realised it could prove beyond almost any manager. It would seem justified to wonder whether it was an objective motivated by egoism as much as love.

A degree in electrical engineering and a master’s in economics, Wenger exudes intelligence and educated in a field founded on truisms, it is perhaps no real surprise that his team’s style has evolved into an absolute. Indeed, the imagination of one who conceives in science and maths seems hugely influential in all Arsenal’s football: angles, refraction and a playing imperative with all the precision of calculus.

Though, given the righteous beautifying innate within the French and their postulations in football, Wenger will inevitably observe through an artistic lens equally as vividly as that of the scientific. Indeed, Wenger has openly hypothesised that football is now another legitimate art-form.

It is of no consequence, but it is easy to imagine that if Wenger’s conceptualisation of football could be symbolised in a piece of art, the result would be akin to the work of Russian surrealist Wassily Kandinsky.

Unfortunately for Arsenal, however, football is not a game predominantly of grids or absolutes, nor is it sketched with the arc of a compass. Football remains a game played by free-willed individuals and all clubs are subject to external forces. Of course, Wenger does not stand alone in the desire to inculcate an ideologue into a football club and although Ajax is another example - a close relation in many ways - it is openly accepted that the style Wenger most seeks to mimic is that of Barcelona’s.

Herein lie further shades of grey: although Johan Cruyff successfully insinuated an evolutionary leap into the football paradigm via the Catalan club, it was also much of a staccato process. Barcelona suffered growing-pains during their reinvention: the Dutch heavy era of Van Gaal ultimately succumbing to the weight of expectation; between 2000 and 2004, the team won nothing; whilst Frank Rijkaard’s term ended anti-climactically, after it became increasingly stodgy and ill-disciplined, self-indulgent.  

Moreover, while Barcelona’s educational infrastructure [La Masia] has been evolved over decades, Wenger has sought to accelerate the culture in his Islington petri-dish, players pulled together from far more disparate homes than the current grouping in Cataluña; no collective identity unites this Arsenal dressing-room, just a moral loyalty to Wenger and to the club, to differing extents. A shared intelligence and appreciation of collective aspirations is fundamental to the Catalan’s playing style – this is how Barcelona consistently exceeds the sum of its parts.

Though, of course, Barcelona have also been able, and willing, to operate at a different level to Arsenal in the transfer market: the Catalan’s spending over €700m since the turn of the century; whether it is Wenger or the Board that are unwilling to invest in recruitment to the extent that they might is unknowable, which is unfortunate for those fans seeking to make a definitive judgement on their manager.

However, perhaps most significantly, this Barcelona simply possesses something Arsenal does not: three extraordinary footballers performing on a different level to any at Wenger’s disposal, all home-grown, all attuned to the club’s playing philosophy: Messi, Xavi and Iniesta.

Effectively a poorer version of Barcelona; the predictability of Arsenal’s system can render the team exactly that, but also undermine them before a game even begins. Where Ferguson, Ancelotti, Dalglish et al are able to ensure Wenger remains uncertain over the team and formation Arsenal may be facing, the only question they have in evaluating Arsenal’s strategy is which digits will they use in Wenger's [one] carefully constructed football equation.

It is indisputable that everything good about “this” Arsenal originates from within Wenger and when they achieve solutions he is acutely responsible, but he is now undeniably complicit in their prevailing flaws and his simple inability to appoint a new Assistant manager could be his biggest failing.

Sir Alex Ferguson’s career at United has been punctuated with myriad Assistants – Knox, Kidd, McLaren, Ryan, Smith, Quieroz and Phelan – all forcing the United manager to evolve from consistent exposure to new ideas and to perhaps temper his own methods to reflect the changing attributes around him; Arsene Wenger has retained Pat Rice as his number two since 1996.

Dragan Stojkovic has been named by Arsene Wenger as his intellectual soul-mate where football is concerned, also asserting that the Yugoslavian manager of Nagaya Grampus Eight would be his ideal successor as Arsenal’s manager. Wenger advancing to a role upstairs, whilst his friend takes his role on the bench, would seem likely, at some point in the future; but more of the same or mutual back-slapping might not be what Arsenal need, attention to defensive organisation and set-pieces might be of greater value. If he remains without help, Wenger will at least have to challenge himself.

Whilst, Pat Rice seems insitu, solutions on the playing side will certainly be sought. Although, they are unlikely to be found in the combination of Scott Parker, Brede Hangelaand, Robert Green or Michael Owen, as one pundit advocated; any reference to a lack of Englishness being the cause of Arsenal’s impotency is just a classic case of Godwin’s Law.

Keisuke Honda, Karim Benzema and Eden Hazard have all been mentioned as targets of the club and all would improve the team’s quality. But regardless of quality, the Arsenal dressing-room also lacks characters without fear, who take defeat as a personal slight and who see passivity as a preserve for others. Yann M’Vila and Christopher Samba are both rumoured targets; both would dramatically improve the team’s mentality and its physicality.

And unfortunately for Wenger, one further challenge lays ahead: the annual transfer tug-of-war over Cesc Fabregas is still to be fought; a time will surely come when the team’s best player seeks to increase his chances of success, if not securing his preferred return home.

These are clearly testing times for Arsenal - with United, Chelsea, City and Liverpool all in the team’s vicinity - but the odds favour Wenger keeping the club competitive, if he is able (and/ or willing) to spend at the same level as his rivals, based on his performance without real financial expenditure.

Sheffield: a city steeling itself

During recent weeks, the football world has found itself focused upon, arguably, the world’s biggest derby game between, arguably, its two best current teams: the El Clasico in Spain, involving Real Madrid and Barcelona. And after four games between the two in eighteen days, they have found themselves locked in a fight for political, moral and football supremacy - the media gripped in its thrall.

But on Monday this week, another derby game with a unique history - one that will be forever unparalleled - was being played elsewhere with far less interest and in far less glamorous surroundings: in Crosspool, an ordinary suburb of Sheffield; featuring Sheffield FC of the Evo-Stick League Division One and Hallam FC of the KoolSport North Counties East Football League Premier Division. They were celebrating and commemorating the anniversary of the world’s first inter-club football match, featuring the same two clubs, played 150 years ago.

While Sheffield FC is accepted as being the oldest football club, founded in 1857, Hallam FC is the only one with documentary evidence to prove its claim of being the second oldest, verified as 1860. The “rematch” between the two was once again played at the historic Sandygate Road Stadium – home to Hallam FC - the oldest stadium in the world and with a capacity of 1,400.

Such is the appreciation that Corriere Dello Sport [of Italy] also covered the build-up to the game: describing Sheffield FC as “The Mother of Football”; and with a romance that transcends Italian-English translation going on to say “We are at the dawn of football.” Also highlighting how Genoa, the oldest of Italian football clubs, was not founded until 1893.

Yet, despite the feel-good factor generated by yesterday’s fixture, the reality is that these are watershed times for the eldest statesman of world football and at Sotheby’s, in London, on 14^th July 2011, Sheffield FC is to auction-off the original [handwritten and typed] rules of the club game - documents that initiated the lineage towards the game that we know now - in a bid to secure a future.

Many of the innovations that we enjoy can be traced directly back to the imagination of a collection of flat-capped Yorkshire-folk in the 1850s. Ironically, in that era, it would be inevitable that the Honorary President of the club - one Sepp Blatter - would find himself in direct conflict with the game’s “mother” in a debate over the introduction of technologies; Sheffield hosted the first floodlit football game in 1878, in front of 20,000 fans.

The value estimated on the lot has been placed between £800,000 and £1.2million. The people of Sheffield were wise not to turn this to Pulp. Richard Rims, the current chairman of Sheffield FC, explained that “The sale of this remarkable piece of sporting history will allow the club to develop facilities and secure it future as the home of grass-roots football.” It is unfortunately a necessity: Sheffield FC has never owned its own ground and since 2001 has played at the “Coach and Horses” pub in Dronfield - an occupation that was inaugurated with a game against a Manchester United XI; the case of a regularly moving object meeting an immovable one.

So, if the game yesterday passed with little fanfare, one Sheffield derby might garner more interest next season, as the Steel city’s two biggest clubs - Wednesday and United – are guaranteed to be spending season 2011/12 together, this time in League One. The Owls by virtue of a failed attempt at promotion this season, placing in mid-table and the Blades as a result of relegation from the Championship; both clubs finds itself on a journey that it hopes can only get better.

How United must rue the appointment of a manager as inexperienced as Gary Speed at the start of this season. Having the Premier League’s most famous quiz answer in “Brian Deane” or the wonderful “Greasy Chip Butty” interpretation of John Denver’s “Annie’s song” will be scant consolation for the fans who will suffer as a result of the owner’s naivety.

Both clubs have fallen fast and fallen far. Within just these last ten years, for instance, Neil Warnock guided Sheffield United back into the Premier League and was also able to take them to the Semi-Finals of the FA Cup and League Cup in the same season. And of course, prior to that, Dave Basset – the arch-pragmatist – was able to guide them to successive promotions from the third-tier back to the top-flight between 1988 and 1990. Hod-carrier/ actor / midfield hard-man: Vinnie Jones also found himself in the Blades’ midfield and was the perfect captain, an embodiment of their play in that era.

The Owls: another Sheffield club steeped in history; the third oldest in the Football League; a founder member of the Football Alliance in 1889. Yet age does not equate to success for them and their only trophy since 1935 is a Rumbelows Cup win in 1991. And therein is some salt to be rubbed in the Blue and White of this city’s current wound, at least where the Red and White part are concerned. The scorer for “The Wednesday” that day, as Ron Atkinson’s burgeoning side overcame Sir Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United by virtue of a 1-0 victory was John Sheridan; a hero to the club but now regenerating another just 12 miles away from Hillsborough, and 7 miles from Bramall Lane.

Whilst, where Sheffield Wednesday is concerned, the memories of Chris Waddle, Paolo Di Canio and local lad David Hirst wearing the club colours must seem almost Jurassic now; the former of those names also being awarded Footballer Writer’s Player of the Year whilst at the club. Indeed, to put it into context, they were once in a position to request that Eric Cantona proved himself to them by virtue of an extended trial, a request that the Frenchman rejected - how pivotal that moment was in the club’s fate since will forever remain unknowable, but.

On the Yorkshire/ Derbyshire border, the market town of Chesterfield is now home to a cultured midfielder whom will forever be associated with Sheffield and who, as manager, has guided the “Spireites” into League One this season with such aplomb, that Don Goodman described them as “perhaps the best League Two side ever” and they were hugely unfortunate to succumb to The Owls on penalties, in the Johnstone Paint Trophy, late last year. Chesterfield will be the third team in what promise to be a spicy set of derby games for season 2011/12.

And whilst the Blades will undoubtedly enjoy any successes that Sheridan enjoys over his former club - particularly so, since Dave Allen the owner of Chesterfield was recently a director of Sheffield Wednesday and who felt inclined to leave due to fan pressure - they will be as slighted as any, if a small club from just down the road - most famous for a Crooked Spire and one FA Cup run – achieves its stated aim of promotion to the Championship at the first attempt, at their expense.

There are positives for the city’s two professional clubs, of course. Sheffield Wednesday - with a 39,814 capacity stadium, an average attendance of 17,669 and a high of 23,081 - remain one of the powerhouses in League One and are a sleeping-giant with potential to compare with – if not a Manchester City or a Leeds United - the likes of a Birmingham City, a Norwich City and perhaps a West Ham United.

Whereas, for Sheffield United, they have a youth set-up established that is as fertile as a club could hope and its products have been able to gain valuable experience, supplementing the first-team all season; indeed, the Blades youth team finds itself contesting the FA Youth Cup final against Manchester United over two-legs, later this month. While, with an attendance high of 23,728, an average of 20,632 and a capacity of 32,609, they will also be a force to be reckoned with in League One next season and quite naturally looking to return to the Championship at the first attempt.

But, regardless, next season will require much of the famous Yorkshire grit, if these famously proud residents are to enjoy the competition that lies ahead.

PS,

For those who are interested, Sheffield FC was the victor in the world’s oldest derby, by a margin of 2-1. A report can be found at Crosspool.info. It was written by “robin”.

http://crosspool.info/2011/05/02/sheffield-victorious-at-historic-anniversary-match/.