Pre-match blues: Another night with an imbalanced England midfield

As we ready ourselves for another evening of England, I wanted to look at some of the aspects of our current midfield and how it's affecting the style of play and tempo at which we're approaching international fixtures.

I'll keep it short and sweet but i'll follow it up with some analysis following the game and before the equally crucial match against Poland.

It's likely that Roy will play 4-3-3 again tonight and if he's consistent with recent matches, he'll pick Wilshere-Lampard-Gerrard as his midfield axis

I've got real issues with that trio for a number of reasons.

Firstly, it's the arrogance. Not one of the three is suited to playing the anchor role with any nous or conviction and without somebody to sit and protect the back four, you do fear that we're open on the counter. It's a struggle to name an elite team in Europe (domestically or on the international stage) who doesn't play with a holding midfielder and yet Roy feels that we don't need one. I just can't buy the argument that we don't need somebody to play that role at home against Montenegro. It's disrespectful to solid opposition and it stinks of the exact type of arrogance which has plagued our national side for decades.

Secondly, it's the balance, or rather I should say lack of balance. Roy is selecting three guys who love time on the ball (they often dictate play when playing at club level) so the manager is essentially asking each of them to reduce the amount of possession and touches that they're all used to by a third. Who of the three would you mark out as the player who monopolises possession for England? Could you confidently answer? I can't and it often appears as if there is a battle between the three of them to get on the ball and stamp their authority on the way in which we're trying to play.

Finally, they just won't go beyond the ball. We're picking three midfielders who aren't exactly renowned for their movement off the ball and it's strangling our options when we're in possession. Lampard used to be excellent at breaking late into the opposition's penalty area but he's not got the same legs as he once had and he's more suited to taking up a deep lying role. And what's more, you can copy and paste that statement for Gerrard, leaving Jack who isn't a natural goal-scorer and is also much more comfortable with the ball than without it.

Whilst Roy continues to select them on the basis of them being the three best midfielders in the country, England won't have a chance of moving forward as a national side. They might well be the best of the current midfield crop but they're all of a similar type and picked together they make up an inefficient and lacklustre midfield without any zip, panache or flair.

Now let's hope they go out tonight, make me look like a prize fool and put on a show.

Off the Ball: Stephane Sessegnon - Manchester United (a)

This is the first of a weekly feature that I'm going to write following every weekend's games and goals in the Premier League.

The aim is to bring some attention to those who rarely receive it. To the players who make a contribution to a goal being scored without being credited with an assist or the goal itself. The focus of these articles are on those players who don't win you any points in your fantasy football team or find their photo alongside a match report. This feature is about work off-the-ball and it's about creating space for others by dragging defenders out of position and opening up space for a fellow team-mate.

The first in this series highlights the role of Stephane Sessegnon in creating the wonderful goal scored by Morgan Amalfitano this weekend at Old Trafford. Sessegnon, offloaded by the now ex-Sunderland manager Paulo Di-Canio this summer, is not somebody noted for his work-rate but on this occasion he excelled himself on a number of levels.

As Amlfitano carried the ball into United's half, he was chased hopelessly by Januzaj and faced with the opposition centre-backs, Evans and Rio Ferdinand.

In this situation you would have expected one of the defensive pairing to go out and meet him, but the run of Sessegnon left both in no man's land.

Coming from behind Rio, the WBA attacker darted between the two centre-backs, dragging Ferdinand's attention away from the oncoming Amalfitano.

Sessegnon carried on his run to the right touchline, forcing Evans to hesitate and leave Amalfitano to drive towards goal.

Sessegnon's movement stopped Evans from confronting the ball and pulled him completely out of the action.



Amalfitano was left one-on-one with Rio who found himself with completely the wrong body shape to make a decisive challenge.

A quick nutmeg and a classy finish later and West Brom were one up at Old Trafford.

You can view the goal by following the link below...

▶ The goal... - YouTube

Thanks for taking the time to read.

Per Mertesacker - defying the 'laws' of the Premier League

A quick search of Per Mertesacker's name on Twitter and you'll quickly get a feel for the general public's perception of Arsenal's enormous German international.

'Slow'

That seems to be the word most commonly associated with Per. The word that consistently appears against his name, week after week, game after game. It's there every time Arsenal concede a goal and it's there every time the Gunners lose (although that hasn't happened very often recently).

Mertesacker's speed is highlighted by opposition coaches (Chelsea coach Christophe Lollichon expected Marseilles to exploit Arsenal by targeting Per in their recent Champions League fixture) and it's routinely picked on by pundits as a weakness in Arsenal's defence.

And yet, for all his athletic deficiencies, Per is continually selected for Arsenal and remains the mainstay of Germany's defence. It just doesn't add up.

Is it that the likes of Wenger, Low and Klinsmann have been blind to this for all these years? Do they not read the results of Per's sprint tests?

Or is it that Mertesacker, now capped 93 times for Germany, makes up for a lack of speed by being one of the most intelligent centre-backs to have graced our league in the last ten years?

I suspect the latter.

With or without Per

Whichever way you want to look at it, Arsenal are on a mighty fine run.

Since a 2-1 defeat to Spurs in March last season, they've lost just once on the opening day of this year to Aston Villa and beaten the likes of Bayern Munich, Marseilles and their North London rivals (in a more recent fixture) along the way. You don't need to be a detective to see that their run of form coincides with a consistent partnership between Koscielny and Mertesacker and the stats speak for themselves.

In the last 18 matches, they've averaged a clean sheet every other game and effectively blunted the likes of Soldado, Michu, Berbatov and Lukaku on separate occasions. They've only drawn twice since the defeat in March and only against Villa have the pair conceded more than once in a Premier League match.

There is no doubting that Koscielny has been crucial to Arsenal's change in fortunes but he's not often singled out for criticism. Per, on the other hand, has been targeted ever since joining Arsenal and yet his performances suggest that much of the criticism has been unfair.

The German's stats are up there with the best when it comes to interceptions and aerial battles won, and whilst he's not somebody who wins lots of tackles, he makes up for that by giving so few fouls away. Oh and to top it off, he's even managed to chip in with three goals, the most recent against Stoke last weekend.

Those first five yards...

Playing centre-half for Arsenal is no easy gig.

Wenger's style permits his full backs to involve themselves in the play whenever his side have got the ball and the likes of Gibbs and Sagna are deemed essential when Arsenal attack. It makes the Gunners a potent attacking force but it also leaves them vulnerable if they give the ball away.

The pitch below shows the space left for opposition teams to exploit when counter-attacking Arsenal. With the full-backs out of position, Mertesacker and Koscielny are left to cover vast swathes of the pitch.

So, the question is: How could somebody like Mertesacker, deemed lethargic, cope with these situations and still remain effective?

With Per, it's all about those 'first five yards' being played out in his head. The German clearly has an outstanding football brain that allows him to anticipate danger and cut out threatening attacks decisively. His positional sense is unmatched across the league and it enables him to deal with attacking players whose speed he can't match. Where other defenders rely on their athleticism to get them out of trouble, covering up mistakes, Per consistently gets himself in the right place, at the right time, and deals with the problem before it becomes catastrophic.




The best is yet to come

Mertesacker has been prodigious at the heart of Arsenal's defence and Wenger is reaping the reward for showing faith in the towering defender. His leadership qualities are gradually coming to the fore, he's got the respect of his teammates and slowly but surely, he's starting to win round the doubters.

The obsession with athleticism and in particular, speed over the ground, has driven people to assume that a lanky and ungainly athlete like Mertesacker would never make it in the English top flight. And yet, if we were to look at the central defenders who've stood out in the Premier League era, they'd all have one thing in common; a footballing intelligence that surpasses their more athletically gifted peers.

Per fits nicely into this category.

Thanks for taking the time to read.

Fresh start and a new direction

Where to begin?

It's been a few years since I last wrote anything related to sport and although the odd person has encouraged me to start up again, I've not felt compelled....until now.

For those of you that know me, I'm seeing this as an opportunity to take some of my typical weekend pub-talk and turn it into something worth reading. I'm challenging myself to create something from all the opinion and all of those predictions which fill up too much of your lives on a weekly basis.

A cousin of mine planted this idea a year or so ago after one of those 'chats'. The sort of 'chat' which typically sees me talking sport at either a family member or friend for a considerable period of time.

If i re-call correctly, I was defending a number of Arsenal players,who at the time were unpopular among both mainstream media and the majority of fans. Becoming increasingly frustrated with my point of view, James (my cousin) asked for something more substantial to support my argument and suggested I do something worthwhile with my unconventional opinions.

I didn't listen but I think it's a pretty good idea and so here I am writing now.

Ultimately this blog is about the following:

• It's designed to show people, who base all of their opinions on the five minute clip edited by the team at MOTD, that there is another way to look at things.

• It's intended to show up pundits who watch highlights for a living and provide lazy soundbites to be gobbled by the masses and regurgitated in every public house across the country.

• It's aimed at all the naysayers and all the 'one bad performance in a televised game and he's useless' types.

• It'll be statistical, it'll be tactical and obviously it'll be controversial.

First up, the BFG...G (Big Friendly German Giant if you're wondering) - Per Mertesacker.

Thanks for taking the time to read