Everybody Has Theirown
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
The revolutionary GENIUS of Johan Cruyff As both player and coach, the innovative DUTCH LEGEND always revelled in using the unexpected to bewilder opponents Everybody has their own between 1971 and 1973 – and made the Franz Beckenbauer said: “It owed more to the football philosophy. Johan Cruyff’s is Netherlands team that almost won the 1974 element of surprise than any magic formula. remarkably simple. “Football,” he said once, “is FIFA World Cup one of the most revered sides The Dutch got away with it for so long because throwing the opposition into chaos. If you get of all time. It couldn’t have worked without the opposition could never work out what past your man, you throw the opposition into Cruyff at its epicentre; directing play, tactics they were facing. There were no tactics, chaos. Creating a one-man advantage using evaluating it and adapting it. just brilliant players with the ball.” positional play has the same effect. If you don’t David Winner, in his book Brilliant Juvenal, South America’s respected writer get past your man, or create that extra man Orange, likens Cruyff to Pieter Jansz on football tactics, differed from Winner and advantage, then the opposition stays Saenredam, the 17th-century Dutch painter Beckenbauer. Writing in August 1974, weeks organised and nothing happens.” In his eyes, famous for the way he manipulated space after the Dutch had defeated Argentina 4-0 in “the one-man advantage is total football”. on canvas. This line of thought is repeated on the World Cup’s second group stage, he noted: The game’s historians, intellectuals and the official website for the Dutch coaches’ “At Ajax, the idea of circular football developed, theorists will argue that it is a lot more association, which proudly declares: “Our in which each player moved like the concentric complicated than that. Total football, a coaches are modern Rembrandts.” circles that are formed in the water when you philosophy perfected by Cruyff’s mentor, Rinus throw a stone. The stone that fell in the water Michels, is an attacking style in which every THE DUTCH DICTUM was the player with possession. Starting from player can change position to exploit space The players who led this revolutionary there, the rotation in blocks began, with four, and confound their opponents. It worked approach to football have sometimes five, six … the players that were needed.” brilliantly for AFC Ajax when they won three downplayed the intellectualisation of their Circular football, as perfected by that Dutch European Champion Clubs’ Cups in a row game. Cruyff’s great friend and opponent side, left Argentina reeling and not a little 17 CHAMPIONS MATCHDAY COVER STORY perplexed. Defender Enrique Wolff said after since been periods when pragmatism entranced the world and inspired one of the the side’s central midfield mastermind, would all played under Cruyff back in the THE TRAILBLAZER the match: “I’ve never seen anything like this. triumphed over romance, that vision of most famous clubs, FC Barcelona, to effectively win this competition twice as Barcelona coach, Netherlands before moving to Italy. Five ways Johan Cruyff There’s no way to stop them. They attack with their identity remains as strong as ever. say: “We want some of that”, hiring Michels, playing a style of football that could be traced The fact that this tactical challenge had changed football seven and defend with 11. They kill you marking You could, as Perfumo suggested, make Cruyff and his midfield team-mate Johan directly back to Cruyff’s days on the pitch and emerged from Italy surprised many. The and pressing you and when they get the ball, a case that the same division applied across the Neeskens in the hope of transforming the club. in the dugout. country had dominated Europe in the 1960s INTRODUCING A MODERN they lose their markers at the same time. entire game. Enthralled and inspired by the Success wasn’t immediate – Barça’s best Ironically, the hegemony of Cruyff’s using catenaccio, the very antithesis of the GOALKEEPER Cruyff gave orders and the rest followed. We glory of Alfredo Di Stéfano, enthused by his performance in the European Champion Barcelona in Europe would be challenged by Dutch philosophy, and Gianni Brera, the It was Cruyff’s idea to replace the were outnumbered all over the pitch, the fearless visionary coach Michels, Cruyff helped Clubs’ Cup with Cruyff as a player was to reach Arrigo Sacchi, an innovative young coach who most influential Italian football writer, was Netherlands goalkeeper Piet Shrijvers with whole 90 minutes.” created a glory that, although fleeting, the semi-finals in 1975, losing to Leeds United acknowledged the Dutchman as a mentor. particularly critical of “presumptuous total Jan Jongbloed (below), who until the age of 15 had played as a striker, ahead of the AFC – but the gamble finally paid off. When Drawing on the great Real Madrid CF side of football”. Yet, as John Foot notes in his book, 1974 FIFA World Cup. The Dutch national Cruyff took over as coach, he began to reinvent the Di Stéfano era that had inspired Cruyff and Calcio: “There were continuities between the team, whose defenders were so often in the the club. He changed as much as any coach Michels – and the Ajax and Netherlands sides supposedly contradictory systems. Helenio opposition’s half, needed a keeper who acted like a sweeper. For Cruyff, anticipation “I’VE NEVER SEEN ANYTHING LIKE IT,” could: the style of football, the emphasis on of the 1970s – Sacchi created a pressing, Herrera’s teams contained elements of total was more important than a good save. We youth, the kind of players in the squad. And in attacking 4-4-2 that helped AC Milan reach five football. In the [legendary FC Internazionale often mention the false No9, but there is SAID ARGENTINA’S WOLFF. ”THERE IS 1992, he delivered the trophy the long-suffering European Cup finals in seven years, winning Milano side] Grande Inter, attackers came back, also a false No1. Barça socios had hungered for: the European three of them (1989, 1990 and 1994). It was no defenders moved forward, space compressed. REPURPOSING MIDFIELDERS Cup. The captain of that ‘Dream Team’, coincidence that three of the most influential Taca la bala – attack the ball – was Herrera’s At FC Barcelona, Cruyff preferred a trio of goalkeeper Andoni Zubizarreta, is now the players in Sacchi’s great team – Marco van most-repeated slogan. Pressing was a key part defenders to a back four. The central player, NO WAY TO STOP THEM. THEY KILL YOU” Ronald Koeman, was educated as a club’s director of football and Josep Guardiola, Basten, Ruud Gullit and Frank Rijkaard – had of the successful Inter teams of the 1960s.” midfielder and often strode out of defence – creating a back two and bulking out the The Argentina team’s confusion was centre of the pitch. The idea that midfield is encapsulated in an exchange in the dressing DUTCH TREAT the most important area of the pitch, and therefore midfielders are the most useful room at the interval. As defender Roberto Cruyff beats Argentina’s Daniel players, is shared by Josep Guardiola. The FC Perfumo recalled: “At half-time, I was told to Carneval to make it 4-0 to the Oranje in the 1974 World Cup Bayern München coach, a midfielder under press the one who came with the ball. And Cruyff when Barça won this competition in I answered: ‘Which of the five?’” 1992, has repurposed midfielders to play everywhere but in goal. Miguel Brindisi, an attacking midfielder in that Argentina side who went on to enjoy FIELDING FALSE No9s a distinguished career as a coach, was Despite Gerd Müller’s astronomical goal count, Cruyff was critical of the striker mesmerised by Cruyff’s performance. “[For] because he felt the German played like the first ten minutes Cruyff played as a right the archetypal No9, with limited movement. midfielder, then he switched to the left wing, With Cruyff, the lines between positions became blurred. The player had at least to later he was left-back, then right-back. In the be able to play in the position next to him. second half, he moved to left wing again. And The No9 could move into a midfield position when Perfumo took a free-kick and one or to the wings, while someone else slotted Dutchman was knocked out, they tried to play in to fill the role he had vacated. the offside rule. Cruyff was the only one who PREACHING ONE-TOUCH FOOTBALL realised there was this man on the ground, “The ball will never become tired,” explained leaving everybody onside, and he rapidly Cruyff. “But the player will if he is condemned to watch how the other team’s retreated to play as sweeper and clear the ball.” players play the ball with one touch The entire Argentina team was unnerved. between them and no chance to intervene.” Perfumo noted: “They always had at least three He was determined that football is about free options of play: a short pass, a medium the brain, not how strong or fast a player is, and that the ball should be made to do the pass and a long pass. And Cruyff never makes work. That influence is still evident at Barça the same play twice. If we’re being honest, more than 20 years after he led them to we have to talk of football as ‘before Holland’ the European Champion Clubs’ Cup. Players such as Lionel Messi, Xavi Hernández and and ‘after Holland’.” Andrés Iniesta have become stars despite their relative lack of physicality.