Tactics, goals, morality and the beautiful game

By Marcus van Geyzel

After a month of buzz, drama and incessant football, Spain are world champions. This World Cup has been the most widely-covered in history, not only because of satellite, internet and mobile-device match broadcasts, but also internet websites, blogs and tweets. Sifting through all the noise (and I’m not referring to the buzz of the vuvuzelas), a few things stood out. The human side of football has surfaced as never before. To fill the print and virtual spaces, pundits moved beyond the traditional realm of lineups and tactics, leaping at any chance to preach about “morality”, the “beautiful game”, acclaiming heroes and decrying villains. Moralising the game became very much a central theme.

Much praise is due to the hosts, South Africa. There were widespread fears before the tournament began that stadia would be crumbling, hastily-built structures; the experience for fans would be spoilt by poor ticketing arrangements, and sub-standard transportation; and that there would be rampant violent crime. These fears proved baseless. The infrastructure and atmosphere were fit for a World Cup – yes, even with those vuvuzelas, which I’m told are not as irritating in the stadiums as they are on television broadcasts.

What of the football then? I’ll get the standard “best of” nominations out of the way. Player of the tournament was, deservedly, Diego Forlán. There were many other contenders – the surprise package Thomas Müller, Wesley Sneijder, and any of the Spanish trio of Xavi, Andrés Iniesta and David Villa. Forlán stood out for his stunning goals (making a mockery of those who blamed poor passing and shooting on the Jabulani ball) and for playing like a man possessed – right up until the very last kick of Uruguay’s tournament, where he struck his freekick against the crossbar.

Despite the moaning of viewers who think the quality of football is based only on the quantity of goals, there were some very good goals. The best include Giovanni van Bronckhorst’s vicious long-range strike in the semifinal, Forlán’s curler in the same game, and Sebastián Abreu’s cheeky “panenka” chipped penalty to win the shootout against Ghana deserves a mention. But the best of all has to be Fabio Quagliarella’s long-range chip for Italy against Slovakia. Amidst all the tension and frenzy, he had the class, audacity and sublime skill to float in the most glorious of chips.

Tactically, the tournament underlined the globalisation of football tactics. Teams no longer fit into the traditional stereotypes – Brazil samba-ed no more; Italy didn’t play with the familiar catenaccio rhythm; Germany were a swashbuckling go-for-the-jugular counterattacking force; South Korea and Japan added high-level technique and class to the classic foundations of workrate and organisation; the Netherlands showed only rare glimpses of the Total Football of Cruyff and Krol. The fear of losing has become so strong that most teams played with at least one holding midfielder, some with two in a 4-2-3-1 formation. The only real innovative tactician was Marcelo Bielsa of Chile, with 3-1-3-3.

There was a glaring absence of traditional centre-forwards. The only classic No. 9 who shone was Forlán. Others, like Robin van Persie, Fernando Torres, Samuel Eto’o and Didier Drogba were hugely disappointing. Traditional centre-forwards have been replaced by more industrious attacking players, positioned “in the hole” or as part of a carousel of attacking players – best displayed by the fantastic Sneijder and Villa. Sneijder is the complete package – he lies deep and can shoot from distance, deliver incisive passes, hold up the ball or run at teams. Legend has it that, many years ago, he was given a start for the Netherlands against France in a friendly. At half-time, Patrick Vieira – whom he had given the runaround – approached him to ask whether he was left or right footed, as he couldn’t figure out how the young Dutchman seemed equally good on both sides. Villa too showed first-class movement as part of a trio including Iniesta and Torres (eventually replaced by Pedro), two great feet and top-drawer ball-control and finishing. Another fine example is Germany’s Müller, amazingly just 20.

I mentioned moralising the game earlier, and this started pre-tournament. The Thierry Henry handball that helped France to qualify at Ireland’s expense led to weeks of uproar, debate, requests spanning the reasonable (television replays) to ludicrous (asking for a replay, or admitting Ireland as an extra team). The big moral debate of the tournament was caused by Uruguay’s Luis Suárez’s handball on the line in the very last minute of extra-time of the quarterfinal with Ghana, stopping a certain goal. This was deemed an inexplicable and unjustifiable injustice, and Suárez a cheat who should be banned for a long time. Forget that almost any player would have done the exact same thing. Disregard the fact that he was caught, punished with a red card, and that Ghana got a penalty-kick, which they missed. Football loves a good debate about justice, and pundits can’t resist a moral high-horse.

This idealism could also be seen in the aftermath of the climax of the tournament. Post-match, we were told that Spain’s victory was a “victory for football”, “justice”, “reward for attacking football” and “the way the game should be played” and that a Netherlands triumph “would not have been good for the sport” as they had “soiled, stained and betrayed football”. How’s that for emotive moralising? This was a misrepresentation on many levels.

Firstly, Spain are not an attacking team – their tiki-taka passing game is a defensive tactic designed to hog possession, resisting taking the game to the opponent. It’s no surprise that they triumphed with a string of 1-0s, and their 8-goal total is the lowest ever of a world champion.

Secondly, whilst the Oranje are no saints, the Spanish team is littered with divers, and imaginary-card wavers who roll around making the most of every tackle and then unashamedly crowding the referee into booking opponents.

The Netherlands were accused of playing “anti-football”. This by the same media who unabashedly hailed Jose Mourinho after Internazionale did the same to Barcelona (who make up the core of this Spanish team). Mourinho is, of course, a media darling, so his dirty, defensive and hyper-negative team led by brutal masters of the dark arts like Cambiasso, Samuel and Lucio were praised as tactical maestros. Catenaccio had never been so sexy. The Netherlands meanwhile were cast a villains. Morality and football – there’s got to be a hero and a villain.

Football is a wide, expansive unpredictable game decided by the finest of fine margins. And it is the victors who dominate the plaudits that are remembered by the history books. It could all have been so different if Robben had tucked away two glorious opportunities. Or if he had gone to ground under the last-man challenge of Puyol instead of staying on his feet (and people wonder why players dive).

But let’s not take anything away from Spain – they are deserved champions. They passed the ball miles better than any other team, and dazzled with their technique and movement. They are the first team to have won the World Cup having lost their opening match, which shows the deep belief that their patient footballing philosophy requires. No other team could play the way that they do – their collective ability is unmatched. The Dutch had no choice but to engage negative tactics.

At the end of it all, it’s trophies that matter, and pundits – armchair or professional –don’t even make the footnotes in the story of sporting winners. The “beautiful game” is not just about samba, lightning counter-attacks or Total Football – it’s about passion, emotional debate, heroes and villains, tactics, vuvuzelas, hot Paraguayan models and octopus. Let’s remember the World Cup for the human stories that football brings. South African players singing and dancing into the stadium. Asamoah Gyan bravely slotting in the first penalty of the shootout, having missed the penalty with the last kick of extra-time. Perhaps it can be said that the true champion is the team that didn’t get beaten at all – yes, New Zealand – how’s that for football logic?

Marcus van Geyzel is obsessed with football culture, tactics and the debates they spark.

This article appeared in Options of The Edge Malaysia, Issue 815, July 19-25, 2010

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