Banter 2009/2010

Originally Posted by Revolver

Flamini didn't play RB for Arsenal but LB, and that wasn't for "some games" but for whole season, and it wasn't like "he wasn't that good", he was very good, Ashley Cole was injured for whole season and his absence didn't felt, because Flamini was good.

I've never said that Leonardo should "risk" with Flamini in CL game, I said that he should try him at LB EARLIER! Whatever you or anyone else here think about Leo, you must admit it's not logical to have three good players fight for one position, when we are short for (one) good cover on many positions. At the time, Ambrosini was our main DM, Gattuso was cover, Flamini rarely got the chance, even to come from the bench. He was used in cup games. It was logical that Leo tries him at SB sometimes before most important games of the season (i.e., CL elimination phase), because the man shoved he's capable of playing good, even great, games at both flanks, and at the same time we were short for cover at SB positions, and not just that, but our only good replacement CB was one of the starting side backs.

You don't have to say it, I will say it, Antonini's injury and Favalli's introduction cost us for losing the game we should won by any counts. If we had replacement side back who could step in so that our system stayed intact (which means, high defense and pressure game), we would surely win that game. Favalli's introduction meant that our defense can't play high anymore, which meant no pressure anymore, and a LOT of pressure on our 3-man aging midfield, that was left to fight all alone on enormously big space, with attack too high and defense too low, and that's was the reason we lost that game. If someone don't understand this, with defense playing high there's a LOT less unclosed space on the field, and that's why we dominated in first half and we were outplayed in the second. I drew a simple and quick picture in paint to demonstrate this:

1) Actually, with or without Favalli, our team tends to defend near the goal ... not in the first minutes, but generally after 15-20 minutes.
The 3 players forward (in this game: Pato, Huntelaar, Ronaldinho) never came back to help the other players to defend.

It's the first draw.
(excellent idea to make draws Revolver !!)

2) On the second draw, I added the players of MU with directions for some players. What was easy to notice during the game was that there was often one on one situations and it's why we stuggled so much to defend against them (because of our 3 players forward watching their partners).

The player with "?" (Pirlo) is the one having to keep his position or choose an opponent which would lead to one of the "!" players being free.

3) On the last draw, it's the way this situation could have changed when we had counters ...
Generally, they start from Pirlo who had immediately 2 opponents against him (+ Scholes and Rooney coming back, contrarly to Ronaldinho, Pato and Hunt). Again, this time thanks to the 3 guys forward, if Pirlo could pass the ball to one of them quickly enough, you would end with a one on one situation, which happened actually only once with Ronaldinho against Ferdinand.

We almost never had this situation as their chances gave them a corner, gave us a "GK kick" (don't know how it's called in English) or we conceded.


It's why I tend to say that on this game, the whole team is in fault:
- the 3 forwards never defending
- Nesta and T.Silva sleeping during several minutes
- our midfield for instantly losing the ball and not being able to make a single and simple pass in second half (maybe they were tired because they always had to defend, but the fact that at the end of the game, suddenly, the guys can make passes again is weird ...)

It's not one player or only the coach, it's 8 players (Favalli has his limits, we can't ask him to become WC, and Bonera isn't a RB, Leo chose him because he's better in defence than Abate, as if Leo knew we wouldn't be able to keep the possession, like we did during the first 35 minutes and the last 10 minutes, for 90 minutes).