The headlines, rightly, told of a great night for Chelsea.
The night the finest club side of the era came to Stamford Bridge and left with
nothing, a well worked counter attack in first half injury time combining with
an exemplary defensive display to give them a fighting chance going to the Camp
Nou. The artisans brought the artists down to earth. And in doing so they
proved how right and wrong Dani Alves was in his pre-match interviews.
Alves’ comments were wilfully misinterpreted by at least one
commentator, the one currently masquerading as Sports Writer of the Year. Commenting on the previous semi-final between
the sides ,when Chelsea were undoubtedly a better side and Barcelona still not
quite the footballing masterpiece they’ve become, Alves pointed out that
Chelsea had lost because they kept belting the ball away and giving the ball
back to a side that lives by possession of the ball. And eventually Barcelona
had a chance and took it. James Lawton of The
Independent chose to splutter about the Chelsea penalty appeals that night
and how Alves was guilty of ‘not so much historical revisionism as outrageous
provocation’. Let’s leave aside the
fallacy that a penalty is a certain goal and how any of the appeals being given
wouldn’t have resulted in Barcelona and Chelsea playing out precisely the same
events if any of the appeals were given and scored (yes Chelsea would likely
have gone on to win, but that’s by no means a certainly) and instead point out
that Alves did mention the appeals in his interview. It’s a telling difference
between the attitude of the teams that his view was Barcelona couldn’t control the
referee (although Jose Mourinho would undoubtedly disagree) and instead
concentrated on the factors that were within their control. Lawton’s correct to
point out that the decisions by Tom Henning Ovrebo that night were a major
factor in the result, but his dismissal of Alves’ analysis is incorrect – in
terms of game play Alves was absolutely right. After Abidal’s dismissal Chelsea
were facing ten men and with a 1-0 lead chose to adhere to the tactic of
repeatedly clearing their lines and giving Barcelona the ball. Alves’ point was
that denying Barcelona the ball would likely have been a more effective tactic,
presenting a challenge they might not have been used to and not been able to
handle with Chelsea having an extra man to circulate the ball with. They
abdicated control of the game and presented Barcelona with a lifeline – for all
Chelsea fans can argue over those decisions Ovrebo didn’t gift Barcelona that last
chance.
But where Alves’ analysis falls down a little is his
provocative theory that Chelsea’s approach that night was borne of fear. It
wasn’t, it was simply that Chelsea in 2009 weren’t (and aren’t) a side built to
dominate possession, particularly against a side like Barcelona. The part of
Claude Makelele’s game that no-one talks about, his quietly effective passing
and eternal availability to receive a pass from a colleague who might otherwise
be in trouble has never been replicated, not by Mikel, Ramires, Essien or
Meireles. And if there’s no regular short effective pass then the long ball for
a striker to battle for becomes the uppermost option in any defender’s mind,
particularly those playing in the physical hothouse of the English Premier
League. That instinctive option is what players will fall back on in high
stakes, high pressure situations such as a Champions League semi-final. Is that
a result of fear? Well that’s a philosophical conundrum dependent on your point
of view. And in Alves’ view, where his entire footballing upbringing has been
based on a possession strategy through Brazilian origins and his subsequent
career at Sevilla and Barcelona, it’s a perfectly valid view, indeed it’s
probably the natural one for him to have.
Just as from a Chelsea and English point of view it makes
sense to repudiate it. The possession game is the natural one for Barcelona,
taken to a logical extreme since the measures Cruyff implemented when brought
in as manager bore fruit. It’s not an approach which comes easily to British
sides, as often made obvious by their ineffectiveness in European competition
in its infancy and immediately after the Heysel ban. There are rare exceptions
to the rule – the Liverpool of Paisley and Fagan, Wenger’s Arsenal, Ferguson’s United after Beckham’s departure, which
integrated Carlos Queiroz’s tactical nous with Paul Scholes’ passing ability to
enable them to retain the ball (the signings of Juan Veron and Michael Carrick
could be seen as an attempted move toward a more possession based game than the
counterattacking one normally associated with Ferguson) and even Benitez’s
Liverpool which was centred around the passing of Xabi Alonso. It’s arguably
the relative lack of the midfielder with vision and the passing ability to
execute it which has led to such high scoring games as seen in the first half
of the Premier League season, and is even a reason behind the poor second half
to Liverpool’s season, with Lucas’ injury robbing them of their one player with
the ability to control the game. Noticeably
United’s league form and their defence improved once Scholes returned and, with
his intelligent distribution, they were able to control games again.
Controlling games seemingly remains an alien mindset to the British game,
Benitez and Wenger often coming under fire for their perceived obsession with
it. But then isn’t that only sensible as
if you’re controlling games you’re more likely to win them than if they descend
into chaos?
Back to the narrative though, and with Makelele’s departure
Chelsea lost the one player they had who was truly capable of controlling games.
With him they’d have had little chance of matching Barcelona’s obsession with
possession, without him no chance whatsoever. At that point any manager who’s
ascended to the level of taking charge of a Champions League side would
sensibly dismiss playing Barcelona at their own game as unworkable. Indeed, as
can be seen from Barcelona’s eye opening possession statistics all managers
have essentially dismissed attempting to take on Barcelona by matching their
aesthetic. Instead, it makes far more sense to look at playing to strengths and
looking at what’s worked to counter Barcelona in the past. This Barcelona’s
most famous defeat came in the2010 Champions League semi-finals. Leaving aside
the quite reasonable contentions of Eyjafjallajökull’s ash cloud meaning they
had to travel almost a day by coach rather than hours by air and a wrongly
disallowed late goal, as Alves’ words and Guardiola’s attitude would have us
do, the root of the strategy used by Jose Mourinho’s Inter was to strangle the
space for Barcelona’s passing in the final third of the pitch at the Camp Nou.
It’s the only proven approach which makes sense against Barcelona, and Alves’
talk of fear can also be seen as an attempt to throw Chelsea off their
potential course. But it’s also an approach which plays to a strength of this
Chelsea squad, a defensive base which is still largely that built by Mourinho
and which set the English league record for fewest goals conceded in a season.
Disciplined defending comes naturally, even with Makelele’s departure, and the
physicality of Didier Drogba poses problems for a side which may work hard but isn’t built
around the deployment of strength as an attribute beyond what’s necessary.
That’s the aim, and one common to Hiddink and Di Matteo’s teams three years
apart. Di Matteo and his staff added wrinkles for the 2012 first leg, Mikel often
venturing what, for him, was nosebleedingly high up the pitch (around halfway)
to hassles Busquets. Cole and Ramires provided a pacey attacking threat down
the Barcelona right flank to try and give Alves second thoughts, and when Messi
tried to find space he was largely muffled by multiple defenders. If you were to
reduce this to national stereotypes (a dangerous game given the multinational nature
of Chelsea and key foreign players for Barcelona) the games amounted to English
discipline against Spanish flair. In 2009, as Alves pointed out, English
discipline deserted the Chelsea troops, in 2012 it did not and for one crucial
moment it deserted Barcelona as they lost the ball and succumbed to the fast
counter attack Fabregas had talked about in his pre-match interviews. Chelsea did not lose either of the 2009 games
to Barcelona, and with the win at Stamford Bridge it’s evident that their
tactics were well suited all those games. That’s not fear, that’s pragmatism.
But then it’s hard to argue Barcelona got their tactics
badly wrong either. They progressed to that 2009 final, achieving the desired
result against an awkward opponent and the statistics on all but the scoreboard
last night were the usual avalanche in their favour – 79% possession, 24
attempts on goal and the home side only registering one shot on target (none after
halftime) to cherry pick three. That sort of statistical avalanche is the
hallmark of their game week after week and given their results it’s hard to say
that anything was wrong about their game bar profligacy. There was nothing to suggest
that Guardiola should change his methods – Fabregas should certainly have
scored one of his two chances, Alexis and Pedro beat Cech but not the woodwork.
And the goal was through the area where Alves nominally protects but was
upfield for. Chelsea exploited a minor weakness in the Barcelona system, but
given the goals regularly provided by the attacking impetus of Alves it’s not
something they’ll change – earlier in the season Madrid caught them for a quick
opening goal after an underhit Valdes pass but Guardiola refused to change the way
Barcelona played due to one incident. Believe the evidence of your eyes or the
bare statistics but it’s evident who the better pure football team were last
night. One of football’s great strengths though is that a performance of
discipline such as Chelsea’s last night can at least see them matching the better
team and securing a result. No matter your methods, buying the best or
developing a supernatural youth system, a game isn’t decided simply by having
better players on the pitch.
The thing is that for all the justified praise heaped on
Chelsea they rode their luck – if Alexis or Pedro had caught the ball slightly
more sweetly or if Fabregas hit his shot too well for Ashley Cole to clear off
the line then the narrative would be different; brave Chelsea can’t hang on to
their advantage. Just as both side appeared to have their tactics right three
years ago and fortune fell Barcelona’s way this night fortune favoured Chelsea.
Because sometimes both teams in a match get their tactics right and the story
is simply of how one player or another deals with a moment of pressure better
–and individuals are one of those things it’s often difficult to control in football,
no matter the instructions you give them.
All this goes to prove is where Alves made his cardinal
error in his interview. He asserted that a policy of attack was superior to a
defensive one and would always beat it. Barcelona’s football can verge on
sublime at times; the art of the pass taken to its seemingly ultimate
conclusion. And it can seem invincible without the favours of outrageous
fortune as they hog the ball for long periods, their passing as hypnotic as a
cobra before striking. But just as the cobra can come up against a mongoose so
Barcelona can be beaten by the sort of tactics Chelsea displayed. This is an indictment of one of football’s
great fallacies; that a team based on attacking football is automatically superior
to a defensive one on anything but aesthetic grounds. It’s why Chelsea’s
achievement was more impressive – in an era when the press will almost
automatically praise a team which incessantly attacks (thereby providing them
with entertainment) so it will underestimate a team of an uglier style and, over
a long term, damn them for that approach. Given the extent to which football
has become part of the entertainment industry (and the Sky revolution of the
90s placed it firmly there) it’s become one of the orthodoxies of the game that
teams need to entertain. Of course, as a sport, entertainment is actually a
secondary consideration to a contest between two sides so it’s not true. If
anything, entertainment is a by-product and that’s the fallacy that Alves’ words
propagate, the aesthetic delusion. However good they were in footballing terms
the great sides – Madrid of the 50s, Inter of the 60s, Bayern and Ajax of the
70s,Liverpool of the 70s and 80s, Milan of the 90s, Madrid’s Galacticos and up
to Barcelona today found their own methods of effective defence. They were capable
of not just dazzling sides but putting the work ethic in when faced with the
likes of the modern Stoke on a wet Wednesday in February.
Will Chelsea’s bloody-mindedness win them through? It’s
going to require another performance of iron discipline and concentration in
Barcelona, and almost certainly another few moments where they ride their luck.
But fortune already favours them in one important way – while Chelsea face
Arsenal in an important but not season deciding game Barcelona face probably
the most important game of their league season, the home Clasico in which
anything but a win all but hands the league to Madrid. You’re unlikely to hear
Jose moan about the scheduling which favours his side either, as you might have
if his team had been the ones playing a Wednesday-Saturday-Tuesday schedule. But
if Barcelona don’t win? Well perhaps Guardiola will be too much of a gentleman to
mention it, and Mourinho, eager to perpetuate the Special One myth, certainly
won’t, but once again the fortune of the cup draw will have played a role. And
more than likely Mourinho’s team will have done the ugly things well. It’s
undeniable that the philosophy of Barcelona is the more aesthetically pleasing
but if they win, or Chelsea do to Barcelona what probably their finest team had
done to them in the 2005 semi-final perhaps it’s time to start giving proper
credit to the teams that win ugly.
Not that I’ll stop enjoying Barcelona more than Chelsea. But
then that’s entertainment…
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