Last time I looked at our fullbacks who I felt were playing too deep and too narrow when we had the ball, which might cause congestion in the middle of the pitch. Today I want to look at our centre backs, once again they aren’t my favourite players, I was very disappointed with their actions last season, they continue to make costly defensive mistakes for which they are forgiven, which disappoints me, but like the fullbacks I want to look at what they do with the ball.
I’m not going to be asking for our centre backs to play like Barcelona, to spread to the flanks early and ask for the ball under pressure, and play passes under pressure. Dunne and Collins aren’t capable of that, not a lot of players are, however I certainly believe they can improve their distribution, but I also want to see if it’s all down to them.
Now many, me included, believe that they both tend to hit the ball long far too much. It is worth pointing out that I’m not against an occasional long ball, which can be used to launch a quick counter, and sometimes these hoofs are required when players come under pressure, but it’s the occasions where they hit speculative long balls when they appear to have time that I want to address. It’s no good just saying “our centre backs must hoof it less”, we as a team must give them alternatives, give them a way out, and provide them with an easier pass, maybe make their minds up for them, “but Dunney dun wanna pass it, Dunney wanna SMAASH it”, “Tough, GIVE. Me. The. BALL!!”
This is where our fullbacks can and should be helping our centre backs and it ties into my post about them. I will try not to dwell on the point, but if our fullbacks pulled a little wider and pushed slightly higher up the pitch it would make it less congested in the middle of the pitch, hopefully giving our centre backs more time on the ball to pick out a pass, or move into the space, or wait for a player to get into space, and it would hopefully reduce the amount of hoofs that happen due to them coming under pressure.
The chalkboard above shows the passing of Dunne and Collins against Everton, the same game that we looked at with the fullbacks. It shows that our centre backs are deep, but I am pleasantly surprised by Collins, who takes up consistent positions and looks to play the ball out.
We can see that both hit long balls, Collins attempting 3 and completing 1, Dunne attempting 6 and completing 0. It’s obviously impossible to judge scenario of each pass by a arrow on a pitch, but it does show how deep they are when they hit these long balls. They could easily be attributed as clearances given how deep they are, but they are passes, with the majority occurring just outside our own area, but they are forced this deep because our fullbacks our also deep and narrow, passing to fullbacks in this position could invite heavy pressing from the oppositions wide men as well as their forwards. The only other option open to the centre backs would be to play it into the congested middle of the pitch, which could again prove costly, and so they are possibly forced long by the positions our fullbacks take up.
Dunne, who has Warnock (guiltier of playing narrow than Hutton) on his side, finds himself making passes from very deep, and making more speculative passes than Collins. It’s not surprising that Dunne rarely passes to Warnock (I counted 1); instead he has to look further up the line, resulting in 4 long balls and losing possession on 3 occasions.
So our fullbacks should pull wide, which leaves more space in the middle of the pitch for our centre backs to step into or more obviously for our central midfield to find a few extra yards of space to receive a pass. It would be great to see our central midfielders come deep and collect the ball off our centre backs, and take control of things; something that both Gareth Barry and James Milner used to do for us, which we have never replaced. It is something that I feel our captain should do more often perhaps, taking control instead of leaving it to younger players who Dunne and Collins may not trust as much. I felt this especially when Delph was starting, and would have liked to see Delph slightly more advanced with Petrov being the player collecting the ball off the centre backs.
Barry Bannan is a player who I think can help enormously if he was almost given a free role, he wants the ball all the time, but often has to come deep in search of it, comfortable in possession, he will look to pass it and move, and look to get open again quickly, almost making up teammates minds for them. Again he needs teammates to be constantly looking for space, including the centre backs should Bannan have to return the ball, and he too would be well served by having a wall, in the form of Warnock and Hutton (mentioned in the fullbacks post), on each touchline that he could regularly bounce the ball off.
I have my doubts about Dunne and Collins being able to show the patience required to wait for an easier pass, Collins offers encouragement here against Everton, but on other occasions he reverts to type. For a start I don’t think they particularly like to have the football, in my opinion they are happier when they are the ones without, when they have to fight and scrap to win it back, this was seen as heroic defending under O’Neil, and earned players like Dunne and Collins the plaudits. Dunne continues to perform ‘miracles’ for Ireland against modest opposition, with Trappatoni focusing on defence first, which puts Dunne in his element. Collins however, has been dropped from the Welsh side in favour of a couple of centre backs, with much less experience, but who look after the ball and build attacks rather than surrendering possession by speculative long balls, which has seen the Welsh side improve enormously under the late Gary Speed.
I want to finish by making a case for Ciaran Clark, I think he has been very unfortunate not to start after some of the defensive mistakes by Dunne and Collins that I haven’t covered here, but I’m sure you’re all too aware of. He has started only one game this season, and it was against arguably the toughest opposition (City), we lost 4-1 but I didn’t think the game ended without encouragement, with 2 avoidable goals coming via set-pieces (again), a regrettable goal coming from an individual mistake (Warnock ag…!!), and the last a super strike by an old Villa favourite (Milner).
Above is Clarks passing against City, which is very solid, not only is it accurate, but its relatively consistent compared to Dunne, and he also looks to push forward, only hitting a longer ball when he approaches the half-way line, completing 1 of 3. A third of his passes are made around the half-way line, a much more advanced position, against stiffer opposition, than either Dunne or Collins took up against Everton. Is it a coincidence that this more advanced position Clark takes up sees Warnock push on and grab a goal? So as much as the team can help our centre backs, I think our centre backs can also help the team.
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