Tottenham 4-0 Young Boys: Much-improved Spurs progress with ease
The starting line-ups
A routine victory for a Tottenham side that always looked in control, and are now into the Champions League for the first time in the club’s history.
Harry Redknapp made a few changes to last week’s side – Peter Crouch replaced Roman Pavlyuchenko (who, despite his late wondergoal, was awful in the first leg), whilst Tom Huddlestone came into the midfield alongside Wilson Palacios, Aaron Lennon was selected instead of Giovani dos Santos, and Ledley King got a start too.
Vladimir Petkovic named an unchanged XI, and his side lined up broadly in the same shape as in the first match – albeit with a more conservative slant.
One of the main themes of the game in Bern was Young Boys’ vulnerability from set-pieces – with Sebastien Bassong, in particular, constantly finding himself unmarked, and scoring Spurs’ crucial first goal just before half-time. Bassong was not in the side today – but Peter Crouch was, and his sheer height was always going to cause Young Boys problems.
Just as a Giampaolo Pazzini’s far post header was inevitable last night, Crouch opened the scoring after just five minutes, getting on the end of a cross from Gareth Bale following a corner. In truth, the Young Boys defending was so poor that Crouch’s height was fairly irrelevant in completing the simple task of nodding it across goal into the far corner, and the Swiss side’s stupidity in leaving such an obvious goal threat unmarked meant they were deservedly behind on the night, and in the tie.
Young Boys less impressive
Young Boys’ formation and strategy had a distinct ‘away leg’ feel to it – Scott Sutter’s runs forward were more subdued, and Henri Bienvenu was playing more of a hold-up role than providing a direct goal threat when receiving the ball, as he had done to great effect in the first game. Pascal Doubai played an even more conservative role than in the first game.
That said, they were still retaining possession of the ball nicely (though with less ease than the first leg, as Spurs’ strikers were quicker to close down Doubai, the free man in midfield, when he had the ball.) Young Boys’ pressing was also evident, with Xavier Hochstrasser closing down Wilson Palacios in possession, meaning the away sides’ 4-2-3-1 often looked more like a 4-1-4-1. If anything, they should have done this more, to put pressure on a slightly nervy Spurs backline.
Spurs controlled the game well with the use of a double pivot ahead of their defence – Palacios and Huddlestone both had good games and were sensible, disciplined and positionally aware. The use of that duo in the Champions League group games might prove a better bet than using Luka Modric there, despite the Croatian’s obvious talent.
Huddlestone’s distribution also proved important because of Spurs’ tactic to get the ball wide quickly and directly – Palacios is a fairly average passer and got caught in possession a couple of times, but Huddlestone has the range and passing vision to dictate the game when Spurs have possession. He played a reasonably understated role considering some of his previous passes on European nights but was nevertheless impressive in what he did, knocking the ball around with minimal fuss.
Jermain Defoe scored the second very simple goal when Young Boys had been growing into the game – probably using a hand but nevertheless producing an excellent finish – and Spurs were 2-0 up without ever playing particularly great football.
Second half
Little changed after half-time tactically. Young Boys were still a dangerous prospect, but Spurs defended deeper than in the first leg, not allowing any balls to be played in behind the defence, and the wet surface didn’t help the likelihood of successful balls over the top either.
The third goal didn’t change Young Boys task (to score two) but felt like the tie’s decisive goal – again Crouch scoring at the far post with a header, again Bale providing the assist. Crouch got his hattrick from the penalty spot, after Bale was brought down by Senad Lulic (who was dismissed) but by this time the tie was over. The one final point to note is the quality of the ball played to Bale by Benoit Assou-Ekotto – the combination of those two didn’t work well in the first leg, but the combination here was excellent.
Conclusion
The tie will have provided a good lesson for Harry Redknapp, a man with very little European experience. The use of two holding midfielders in this leg allowed Spurs much more control of the game, as Palacios and Huddlestone were reliable in possession, and Spurs had a better shape defensively. Spurs defended much deeper, so the use of a double pivot meant they weren’t exposed in the resulting space ‘in the hole’.
It also emphasised the need for some level of tactical variation away from home – this direct 4-4-2 with two wingers is fine in games at White Hart Lane where Spurs will dictate the pace of the game and can play the ball quickly to the flanks, but when travelling away (to play trickier opponents than Young Boys) they might need something different. As Sir Alf Ramsey observed half a century ago, “to have two players stuck out wide on the flanks is a luxury that can leave a side with nine men when the game is going against them.”
It was only due to the unavailability of Defoe, Pavlyuchenko and Robbie Keane last weekend that meant Redknapp played a 4-5-1 away at Stoke, but the success of that system might turn out to be very important. He clearly understands the need for midfield steel when away at better sides – last season he tried 4-5-1 twice, away at the Emirates and Stamford Bridge (with Keane shunted out to the left) but it didn’t work as Tottenham lost both games 3-0. Finding a cohesive alternative to the 4-4-2 is crucial.
Tottenham 4-0 Young Boys: Much-improved Spurs progress with ease
Really, we (Spurs) should basically always being playing a 4-2-3-1 with Modric in the hole, but ‘Arry doesn’t seem particularly inclined to put Modders there — it’s either out left in a 4-4-2 or in the center (preferably) paired with Huddlestone.
The Champions League will be great for Huddle. He’ll get the recognition he deserves for being an absolutely fantastic player.
will be interesting to see how good sandro is, is he any good on the ball?, cause palacios is fouling & giving away the ball too much for my liking, also the better teams will expose dawson & assou-ekotto
Sandro is going to England after a great run of games and a title, the Copa Libertadores, a tough competition in the center of the pitch, lots of tackles, etc.
In my opinion, he is better off the ball then on it. His marking and positioning are excellent, but he holds the ball superbly too, because of his strenght and height. You won’t see him doing spectacular things, but his driving runs forward are hard to catch.
Here at Internacional he played the holding role, mainly because his midfield partners, argentinian Pablo Guiñazu and Paulo Cesar Tinga, are monsters that run around the pitch for the intire game (not exaggerating). At Spurs, he would have more freedom with Palacios or Huddlestone, and would have to be contained alongside Modric.
Fast review. One could add that the strength at set-pieces was one of the decisive factors in both games. Spurs looked much sharper and Bern hardly got any half-decent chances from their free-kicks.
Interesting that despite Redknapp’s opinion of tactic (only count for 10% of the game) that he still changes his formations around. But that’s probaly because of lack of other options.
Good article overall.
With two holding midfielders aren’t Spurs playing a 4-2-2-2 system?
No it’s not. 4-2-2-2 formation would mean that the 2 attacking midfield players have a more fluid role, moving infield and roaming behind the 2 forwards. In Spurs case last night, Bale and Lennon hugged the touchline throughout the game as conventional wide players. So it’s definitely a straightforward 4-4-2
Let’s stop putting so much weight on what managers say in press conferences and so forth. Redknapp referred to a Young Boys player as if he didn’t know his name and it’s all over the papers. And he can’t have been in the game this long and not realised that tactics are important.
In his case it’s easy to believe he just thinks putting his arm around a player is enough to get wins, and that he can’t be arsed to learn the other team’s names, because it fits with the general narrative about him as a manager and person.
Ahem, but back to the tactics. Spurs can play the ball nicely around the back four all day, but it always seems to end up at Dawson’s feet and he lumps it up to Crouch, who never has enough time/skill to get the ball down and turn to face goal. So what is it about Spurs that means they struggle to play the ball on the ground through the midfield?
if you have someone like crouch up front the temptation is always there for defenders to knock it up to him, if dawson is on the ball and none of his midfielders show for the ball then he’s definitely going to knock it up to crouch, modric is a big loss for spurs as well
This was especially evident during the Stoke game when they played 4-3-3 with Jenas, Palacios and Huddlestone in the midfield; Huddlestone would sometimes drop down to the where the back four were in order to pick up the ball and try to spray passes to the wings or up to Crouch. In the 4-3-3 however, there was little threat of Bale/Lennon linking up with Crouch until they played more centrally and switched sides from time to time (both goals were from created from Lennon to Bale, but on different sides). It seems that without Modric playing in the middle, Spurs are more content to get it to their wing players in Bale and Lennon, which are the main creative influences in their system. As noted already, Palacios is unexceptional at passing and both Defoe and Crouch are better at playing off the shoulders of the opposing CBs rather than picking the ball up deep and running at the defense like Tevez does. When Pavlyuchenko plays he does a better job of linking up with the midfield but he’s way too trigger happy. Spurs would do well to have another midfielder who is a good distributor as well as solid defensively—perhaps Sandro is the answer?
lassana diarra might be a good option if real madrid are looking to sell,
hard to see him getting a game with alonso, khedira, gago all ahead of him
Spurs seem to avoid being outnumbered in central midfield by not playing there. They played almost exclusively down the wings, with occasional long, diagonal balls to the big striker (be it Crouch or Pavulychenko). Better teams will be better able to counter this rather simplistic style. They need to develop central midfield as something other than a defensive zone.
agree with you.
anyway I wish they could find option B with 4-4-2 formation. I love to see 4-4-2 team beat 4-2-3-1. (My team are playing 4-2-3-1 and i love to learn its weakpoint)
Why do so many people insist on calling Bale a winger.
He’ll never be an outside-forward who can dribble; he’s a wing-back, carrilero, wide-midfielder who needs space in front of him to accelerate.
That my belief. If they switch to a 4-3-3, Bale and Assou Ekkoto will have to fight for the left-back spot. The only option will be them playing a 4-4-1-1 with modric in the hole.There, Bale can still have space ahead of him. But in general, Spurs need to vary their game a bit more.
Re: Ramsey quote
He was speaking at a time before pressing had been introduced; this development would prove that real wingers could contribute defensively and thus could be persisted with.
…plus, Ramsey was referring to the inadequacies of 4-2-4…much different from the British 4-4-2 that would follow later and see the rise of wide-midfield gallopers like Bale.
winger is more used to wide midfielders than wide strikers, get in on with it, i know that in brazil it’s different, but we are not in brazil
Nothing to do with Brazil, where neither wide-mids nor outside-forwards are much used.
It’s a fundamental difference (this is a tactics blog so we are entitled to point these things out), and no, in most of the world a winger continues to be an outside-forward.
Does it? In croatia (and I suspect the rest of the balkans/former yugosloavia) there is no term for wide midfielder. Players playing in front of a full back are called wingers, no matter how advanced they played.
Don’t know about the rest of the world though.
I imagine that’ll be a semantic issue in the case of the Balkans; note the dominant formations there have tended to be 4-3-1-2, 3-4-1-2 and to an extent the 4-4-2, right? Since the wing-backs and/or wide-midfielders tended to be the only discernible wide players (and who are not primarily defensive)in these systems, it seems logical that the term ‘wing’ might be redesignated to what was essentially a different role and even using much different breed of player – take for instance how in Argentina the classical winger tended to become a striker, with other players taking up the wide-midfield and wing-back roles as appropriate per their characteristics. So the semantics cannot disguise the fact that one type of player (a midfielder) is being labelled the same as another (a forward)
Or take Italy, which has an incredibly dense and detailed footballing vocabulary, where the term ‘ala’ (literally meaning ‘wing’) was the term used for outside-fw in 2-3-5, 4-2-4, 4-3-3 etc. That same term ‘ala’ is used in Brazil exclusively to denote a wing-back´in a 3-5-2.
I guess what I’m saying is that in those countries where the use of proper attacking wingers fell into disrepair, the term became appropriated to describe another function or else was ditched altogether.
Conversely, you’ll have a hard time convincing a Dutch football fan that the wide player in a 4-4-2 or a 4-3-3 is essentially the same. Cruyff has even used the term ´striker’ to describe the wingers in a 4-3-3.
You are right that it is a semantic issue. However I do not remember any croatian team (too young to remember serbian teams) playing 4-3-1-2 on a regular basis. 3-4-1-2 was hugely popular and my dad says 3-4-3 was popular earlier. 4-4-2 has gained some popularity in the last five or so years.
You are right that because there have been no wide midfielders in our systems, when they showed up it was easier to brand them as wingers, still nowadays both players, the one playing as a winger and one as a wide midfielders would probably be referred as wingers. Perhaps in the future the term “wide player” which is used for wing-backs will be used for wide midfielders and wingers will be wingers once again. It’s certainly a possibility as 3-5-2 variations and wing-back are dying out (also perhaps it would be interesting to mention that almost all croatian players in last 15 years or so that played for NT as a wide midfielders actually started their careers as wing-backs. Robert Jarni, Darijo Srna, Marko Babic, Danijel Pranjic… only Mario Stanic was a striker though, but there was no decent right wing-back at the time of 98).
Sorry for drifting away from spurs theme, my brain kinda started spiraling into these thoughts and I had to write them. You are right that it is largely a semantic issue here.
The need for an alternative to their successful 4-4-2 is indeed what is required to take spurs that next step in the premiership and, especially, relative success in the Champions League. With the personnel they have, options are available to them. I believe they have the strength in depth in the centre of midfield with Palacios, Huddlestone, Sandro, Kranjčar, Dos Santos, Modric and even O’Hara able to perform a variety of roles.
A lone-Striker role is less easily filled. Crouch can play there, but his lack of mobility means he is far from a world beater in that role, And Defoe alone up front has obvious deficiencies. I could see Keane playing well as a false 9, but the chance that he, his manager and his teammates will be able to learn and perfect a striker-less system whilst on the road in the Champions league is a little far fetched. Pavlyuchenko looks like the best suited to a lone striker role but, like his colleagues, he is hardly going to strike fear into Europe’s finest defences.
The other difficulty is Aaron Lennon’s lack of goals. If he were to play as the right wing of a front 3, I do not believe he has the goals in him to get the most from the system. Bale on the other flank has shown he is capable of getting on the score sheet, but Redknapp has talked about his principal threat coming when he has space in front of him in which to cause damage. Lennon tends to struggle when inverted, but this would help both wide players get into scoring positions more often.
Having said all of this, I believe that with players of the quality of Dos Santos, Bale, Lennon, Kranjčar and Modric, the success of a 4-5-1/4-2-3-1 or 4-3-3 is dependent on a Striker who can still play at his best in a lone role as a No 9. And they don’t come cheaply. With only 1 week in which to find a No.9 (and offload an incumbent), expect to see a gung-ho attacking 442 whenever Spurs take to the field this year. And that will be an entertaining and typical Tottenham, so I’ll be a happy spectator.
I was at the game last night. Crouch was winning everything in the air. It got to the point where it was impossible to tell whether Young Boys were simply struggling to deal with him or whether it was an intentional (and very risky) tactic on their part to let him win it in the air and rely on his usually poor distribution.
When England played against Croatia in Zagreb for the first time (that McClaren’s 3-5-2 experiment), Slaven Bilic played with two relatively short CBs in Robert Kovac and Dario Simic. Simic was tasked with marking Crouch for most of the time, and Simunic (a tall centreback that played as left back) was meant to help when dealing with set pieces. Crouch was largely invisible for most of the game. Bilic let Crouch win aerial battles, knowing that winning the second ball is more important. When ever ball was played in Crouch’s feet, Simic easily dispossed him.
A similar approach was used at wembley later in qualifiers. I often noticed nobody was challenging Crouch in the air, but rather defenders were marking space around him and making sure they cleared any flicks.