2013/14 English Premier League: General Discussion

[Halie Satanus]

Hey, the tiki-taka bollocks worked fine indeed, but with that you need a really good pair of nº 9s who can play as centre-forward and second striker to actually slot the damn ball in… and you need the same to do counterattacks of course. The problem with tiki-taka is that you can't do it lightly, you do it or you do not.

It works for Barca/Spain because of Xavi/Iniesta. But as a system, in the premiership it doesn't hold up.

[Treva ★]

With Xavi and Iniesta it stops being 'light' tiki-taka and becomes the real thing.

And then of course, England has a different system of marking. Spanish defences shouldn't be called that.

[Nazgûl Killer]

English football is far more robust and physical than Spanish football. Tiki taka works fantastic in Spain because everyone's so technical and sometimes scared to even go into challenges. In English football if you try tiki taka you will get one hell of a beating - Which is exactly why the past 7 years Arsenal have had countless injuries, and many 'small' teams have completely nullified us. And it's also why Giroud is on a scoring spree, and Ramsey, Arteta, and Wilshere are dominating the midfield - They are no longer afraid of going into tackles... And Giroud is simply a powerhouse. Tackle him if you dare.

[Ishoss]

By that logic Spain should have been one horrible national team. The reason why Arsenal haven't succeeded at Tiki Taka is:A: They haven't tried.B: Even if they had, they wouldn't have Spain or Barca's players. Nowhere near the quality.As for the injuries, yes England is more physical but also Arsenal haven't had the largest squads. Injuries are more troubling when your backup is Coquelin, Jenkinson, Bendtner etc. rather than Sanchez etc.I am pretty sure if Barca played 3 seasons in the Premier League they would have won it at least once.

[Halie Satanus]

Any system, even a successful one, has a shelf life. Tika-taka is no different and has to a large extent been rumbled. It's not even that new, as I recall Liverpool used a very similar system in the 70's with their 'one touch and pass.' Both, largely, rumbled by the same counter system. A deep lying defense and hit the long ball where big physical strikers can put the defense under pressure. And that's why I think it ultimately failed when Arsenal adopted it. Yeh we didn't have Xavi/Iniesta but few would argue that Arsenal, up until the departure of Cesc, weren't the most attractive football playing team in the PL. The problem being the more physical nature of premier league and the fairly common use of hitting the long ball to big strikers (see Drogba)...

Could Barca win the PL, I'd say so, but they'd also lose games to the likes of WBA, Villa, Stoke ect...

[Adar]

I really cannot understand Mourinho. I thought he was playing mind games and allowed Torres and Ba to "play themselves out of the team" to take pressure off Lukaku as their main forward forward. But instead he humiliates Ba and send Lukaku out on a loan to Everton :S. Eto is a great footballer but it is a great show of fate to bring him in like this.

Any system, even a successful one, has a shelf life. Tika-taka is no different and has to a large extent been rumbled. It's not even that new, as I recall Liverpool used a very similar system in the 70's with their 'one touch and pass.' Both, largely, rumbled by the same counter system. A deep lying defense and hit the long ball where big physical strikers can put the defense under pressure. And that's why I think it ultimately failed when Arsenal adopted it. Yeh we didn't have Xavi/Iniesta but few would argue that Arsenal, up until the departure of Cesc, weren't the most attractive football playing team in the PL. The problem being the more physical nature of premier league and the fairly common use of hitting the long ball to big strikers (see Drogba)...

Could Barca win the PL, I'd say so, but they'd also lose games to the likes of WBA, Villa, Stoke ect...

But Bayern Munich doesn't really play that way.

I would say that you are partially correct. But a deep defence is only a part of the solution to combat the tika-taka. Mandzukic as a strong striker was an important asset to Bayern Munich. But I would say that the final game changer was the movement of Ribery, Kroose and Robben who always moved to ensure that they could receive a pass as soon as someone took the ball from Barcelona. Thanks to their movement they provided "out balls" which ment that the tight pressing used by Barcelona became a lot more dangerous.

[maxi90]

Any system, even a successful one, has a shelf life. Tika-taka is no different and has to a large extent been rumbled. It's not even that new, as I recall Liverpool used a very similar system in the 70's with their 'one touch and pass.' Both, largely, rumbled by the same counter system. A deep lying defense and hit the long ball where big physical strikers can put the defense under pressure. And that's why I think it ultimately failed when Arsenal adopted it. Yeh we didn't have Xavi/Iniesta but few would argue that Arsenal, up until the departure of Cesc, weren't the most attractive football playing team in the PL. The problem being the more physical nature of premier league and the fairly common use of hitting the long ball to big strikers (see Drogba)...

Could Barca win the PL, I'd say so, but they'd also lose games to the likes of WBA, Villa, Stoke ect...

Which is why each and every time Barcelona faced an english team in the CL in the past few years, they were severely defeaten. Oh, wait...

[Adar]

Which is why each and every time Barcelona faced an english team in the CL in the past few years, they were severely defeaten. Oh, wait...

Some times...



Which is exactly what Halie said. They may have good chances to win the league but they would suffer some surprise defeats.

[Petrucci]

What a nice little picture

[Treva ★]

Some surprise defeats, but, erm… in in 2009 Barcelona beat M. Urited in the Champions League final (the semis were a refereeing mishmash so I won't count that), in 2010 Atlético Madrid beat both Liverpool and Fulham on the way to winning the UEFA Cup, in 2011 Barça beat Urited's inconvincibles again, in 2012 both Manchester teams were eliminated from the… Europa League by two Spanish teams which went on to play the final, last season Real Madrid shared a group with the defending English champions and barely conceded an away point… it's not as if La Liga was that terrible compared to the EPL.

[maxi90]

Some times...



Which is exactly what Halie said. They may have good chances to win the league but they would suffer some surprise defeats.

happens. Chealse were incredibly lucky in both legs AND in the final vs BM, that does´t mean Barcelona wouldn´t crush Arsenal and Man U in the PL like they did in the CL.

[Erebus Pasha]

Not really, as I recall Chelsea played very well at Stamford Bridge and were 2-0 down with a man sent off in the Camp Nou before pulling it back to 2-2. Can't say they were lucky based on that.

[Adar]

happens. Chealse were incredibly lucky in both legs AND in the final vs BM, that does´t mean Barcelona wouldn´t crush Arsenal and Man U in the PL like they did in the CL.

No, it is called playing the odds and the Premier League teams tend to be better at it. Which is why Barcelona wouldn't be able to dominate against them like they do in La Liga. Some people seem to believe that Barcelona should win all the time. But the simply fact is that it is not a coincidence that teams like Inter, Chelsea and Bayern Munich have beaten them in the last few years. Bayern Munich is a bit of an exception as they've reached a level where they actually looked good like doing it. In Premier League pretty much every team would set up like Inter or Chelsea did. This mean that Barcelona is going to awesome, dominating the game while sending missile after missile towards the opponents goal. But the simple fact is that these chances got a fairly low chance of scoring as they come from bad angles. But when Barcelona fail to contain opposing outballs you get exactly the kind of situations that we saw Ramirez and Torres convert.

[maxi90]

Not really, as I recall Chelsea played very well at Stamford Bridge and were 2-0 down with a man sent off in the Camp Nou before pulling it back to 2-2. Can't say they were lucky based on that.

You can say they were lucky if you count the numerous times Barcelona hit the wood, and that Messi missed a penalty shoot, an event so rare that it might as well signify the end of times.

Deffending effectively is one thing, being aid by divine intervetion is another.

[Azog 150]

Merseyside remains unbeaten!

Great victory for the Blues today- it was a very entertaining match.

[Erebus Pasha]

You can say they were lucky if you count the numerous times Barcelona hit the wood, and that Messi missed a penalty shoot, an event so rare that it might as well signify the end of times.

Deffending effectively is one thing, being aid by divine intervetion is another.

There is no such thing as divine intervention, it's about putting the ball into the ball in the net - something that Chelsea were better than Barcelona were over the two legs.

[maxi90]

No. Effectivly closing down spaces while you retreat to force your oponent to try improvable shots be cause they are out of options, that is called defending. Having the enemy pierce though your lines time and again to inexplicably miss each and every opportunity while you desperatly park the hole team in front of the goal, that is called being lucky.

[Treva ★]

The 2011/12 CL thread is over there --->

[snuggans]

No. Effectivly closing down spaces while you retreat to force your oponent to try improvable shots be cause they are out of options, that is called defending. Having the enemy pierce though your lines time and again to inexplicably miss each and every opportunity while you desperatly park the hole team in front of the goal, that is called being lucky.

Chelsea cleverly countered one of the world's best midfield & attacking force (at the time) by not attempting to compete in the same "beautiful football" manner but by parking the bus and hitting them on the counter-attack. because that's what works best when you don't have Barcelona's midfield or the world's greatest player.

the misses are not "inexplicable" (except perhaps Messi's penalty but nervousness might be a factor there) because it's obvious that when there are that many bodies inside the box, all trying to block you and block shots, the missing increases.

Barcelona can be arrogant, they used 3 on the back line and paid dearly for it. even a generally malfunctioning Torres scored.

[Treva ★]

What matters is that they won and that Chelski have good publicity, Rangers did the same for a 0-0 in 2007-08 and got lambasted.