Mohun Bagan will take on HAL today at Salt Lake Stadium in their first home match in i-League 2010-11 campaign. Mariners need to display more defensive consolidation along with aggresive attitude to earn full 3 points.
For the mariners, it has been a year of mixed fortune with patches of brilliant outings followed by pretty ordinary display. Runners up in all 3 tournaments (including an invitation tournament) in this year so far, by no means, can be evaluated as ‘living up to the expectation’ for the squad and for the team management of national club of India.
Let’s acknowledge the fact that football is a game where strategy and co-ordination are equally important with skill, stamina and individual brilliance. Here are some of the statistics of the current green and maroon brigade –
> Average age of the squad – 23.1 yrs
> Number of players more than 30 yrs old – 2
> Number of players between 20 and 25 yrs of age – 21
> Number of players represented in Santosh trophy (in 2010) – 11
> Number of ex-TFA players in the squad – 8
> Number of ex-MBSFA player in the squad – 5
Going by the above facts and figures, no one will argue about the stamina, skill and individual caliber of the squad. Although couple of key players still in national duty and Asian quota foreigner is a big question mark; arguably this is really a squad with agility and versatility. Then why are we still haunting for the first trophy of this year? Let’s ask some more questions to ourselves to arrive at the conclusion.
-Is it the goal scoring ability by the ace strikers? Can’t be. Muritala and Chidi have been scoring goal on regular basis along with Barreto.
-Then is it the inefficiency of the midfielders? Most unlikely. Other wise the strikers would have been without the supply in penetrative zone.
-So the problem might have been with the defensive then? And we are perhaps judging correct this time. The team management has not been able to put forward a defense with right kind of co-ordination in the field. Any green and maroon supporter, who has been watching our club’s encounters this year, would be able to point out following shortcomings of our defense –
> The defenders are standing in a line very close to own penalty box when opposition goalkeeper is taking a goal kick.
> We have been allowing opposition to cross the middle third of our own half before we go for the snatching and consequently the final tackle being offered very near to our own penalty box
> Defenders, at times, get isolated from the others due to poor covering and as a result they hesitate to go for the final assault
These have been happening because the Mariners don’t have stable and persistent combinations of stoppers and side backs till today. In world football, this has been a key differentiator in terms of team performance. Whether it’s Puyol-Pique combination in Spain and Barcelona or Ferdinand-Vidic combination in Manchester United, the story remains the same. Unfortunately, for the Mariners, in absence of any such combination, oppositions have been taking the advantage of this shortfall by putting more pressure on our defense and the gap between the defense and mid-field gets widen as the game progresses. As a result, either we concedes early goal and put ourselves into the pressure or are unable to maintain the lead by conceding goal at the later stage of the match.
Now that we might have identified the problem but what is the remedy? We can’t get a magical defensive combination tomorrow or can’t expect the arrival of a foreign player who will change the complexion of the defense single handedly from the next match. Our recommendation is to change the combination of the squad and go for 4-1-3-2 formation instead of 4-4-2 or 4-3-3 formation. Let’s consolidate our defense by placing a player at snatching and linking (between deep defense and midfield) position. This will relieve some pressure on the defense and will ensure more ball supply for the strikers. As the game progresses, depending on the situation, the formation can be changed.
It’s time for the team management to think smart to sail the ship in turbulent weather. We strongly believe that ‘out of the box’ thinking, smart strategy will result in much improved co-ordination amongst the players with skill and stamina. And that is the true recipe of success in the game of football.
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