austim
Joined: 25 Oct 2006
Posts: 3021
Location: Perth WA
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 Posted: Thu May 15, 2008 2:24 pm Post subject: An American soccer mags report on the Huns game. |
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have just had the melancholy experience of watching Glasgow Rangers lose
the UEFA Cup final to Zenit St.Petersburg. It has left me feeling
immeasurably disappointed, and really rather sad.
Now, let me clarify. I'm not feeling put out of joint because Rangers lost.
I really don't give a damn. Nor do I particularly care about Zenit. But I
very definitely do care about the sport of soccer.
Hence my sadness, and - something I didn't mention before - my anger. And
Rangers take the brunt of my wrath for perpetrating an utter travesty of the
sport. You want negative soccer? Rangers supplied it, bucket loads of it,
dreadful, boring stuff. You want caution, you want crude, unimaginative,
inept play? Rangers gave us plenty of all of that, too.
Really, Rangers should be up on a collective charge of bringing the game
into disrepute. This was quite woeful stuff.
But there can hardly be any complaints that it was unexpected, that we
didn't know it was coming.
Just look at Rangers' record in the eight UEFA Cup games that it played
leading up to the final: eight games in which it scored only five goals. But
eight games in which its defensive-bunker tactics meant that opponents were
limited to only two goals! Take a look, too, at the semifinal against
Fiorentina - a two-legged series that produced no goals at all, and that
Rangers eventually won on penalty kicks.
That tells you what really needs to be known, here - and, by my
measurements, it shifts some (but by no means all) of the blame. From
Rangers to the guardians of our game. To FIFA, to the referees, and to
coaches in general.
Surely there must be something wrong in a sport in which a team that
averages less than goal game can reach the final of an important tournament?
Of course, I'm greatly tempted to draw a comparison with the dreadful Greeks
who won the 2004 European championship - a team that averaged 1.2 goals per
game. The Greeks' deplorable performance was successful but the Rangers'
efforts to copy the Greeks (and you knew that, sooner or later, someone
would copy them) happily ended in abject failure.
A failure that was eminently deserved. What is to be said of a team that
isolates a lone forward (Jean-Claude Darcheville) up front, and makes
virtually no effort to get him the ball with a playable pass? Of a team
that was frequently seen in the first half with a line of six defenders at
the back, or with eight defenders in its penalty area? A team that seemed to
be interested only in thwarting Zenit attacks, and displayed little
willingness to attack or any great proficiency in doing so on the rare
occasions when it tried. I imagine that Viacheslav Malafeev, the Zenit
goalkeeper, must have touched the ball sometime in the first half, but I
cannot remember him doing so. That could be due to the fact that I fell
asleep. In the middle of the afternoon.
I'm sorry - but with the best will in the world, this was a craven Rangers
performance that deserved exactly what it got. Why would Rangers play that
way? Well, the answer is so obvious that it is likely to be overlooked.
Teams - Greece and Rangers among many - play that way because they believe
that is the way to win. Greece did win, Rangers got to the final.
So there is some evident justification for the belief in cautious, negative
soccer. Does it make sense to blame Greece's coach Otto Rehhagel or Walter
Smith of Rangers for doing what, statistically, looks like translating into
success?
Hardly. The fault is in the sport itself. Changes are needed, changes that
will greatly increase the importance of goal-scoring. Changes that will make
it clear that the way to win games is to concentrate on attack, rather than
defense. Which means making defensive play a lot more difficult than it
currently is.
I mentioned above that, against Rangers, the Zenit goalkeeper had very work
to do. But the Rangers goalkeeper Neil Alexander was not exactly
over-employed, either - simply because a team - any team, a team with good
players or a team with poor players - can clog their defensive third of the
field, and make it extremely difficult for opponents, however good they may
be - to break through. And so we got a final - a final, mind you! - with all
the soporific certainty of an overdose of sleeping pills.
But Walter Smith must bear some blame for this travesty, for he is the one
who chose to play this way, who chose to field two defensive midfielders and
a lone, barely-used, forward.
A thoroughly tedious game, relieved by flashes of real soccer from Zenit,
and two pretty good goals. Rangers offered nothing, and they got nothing in
return. So be it.
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Ain't it great to be a TIM. |
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