One Wilf Copping
03-22-2014, 02:24 PM
If Mourinho was Arsenal boss (God forbid), he'd have set the team up defensively away from home in a crucial match. He'd want them to be solid, close down the opposition, fight for the 50:50 balls, keep it tight and try - maybe - to nick a goal in the second half.
Wenger tells his team to believe in their ability, that they can win ANY game with their attacking football. Sadly we can't...
In fact we never could. No team can be in that perfect passing groove every game. Sometimes you need different tactics and a different approach.
Most coaches are pragmatists. Wenger used to be at least a little flexible when he first arrived, but isn't now and never will be again... If he'd been more of a pragmatist and varied his tactics we might have won a Champions League with his greatest teams, but we usually fell to 'inferior' teams that were able to vary their tactics - like Chelsea in the quarter-final of the Champions League in 2004.
Sadly this kind of result is probably now a pattern that will repeat itself ad infinitum.
Wenger tells his team to believe in their ability, that they can win ANY game with their attacking football. Sadly we can't...
In fact we never could. No team can be in that perfect passing groove every game. Sometimes you need different tactics and a different approach.
Most coaches are pragmatists. Wenger used to be at least a little flexible when he first arrived, but isn't now and never will be again... If he'd been more of a pragmatist and varied his tactics we might have won a Champions League with his greatest teams, but we usually fell to 'inferior' teams that were able to vary their tactics - like Chelsea in the quarter-final of the Champions League in 2004.
Sadly this kind of result is probably now a pattern that will repeat itself ad infinitum.