Football: Enamorados Del Loco
Source: https://elpais.com/internacional/2016/07/12/america/1468276775_480908.html
By: Gianni Di Girolamo
DISCLAIMER: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the KCL Latin American Society or El Cortao.
In the world of football, Pep Guardiola is considered to be one of the greatest, if not the best, manager of his generation. Having won domestic titles in Spain, Germany and England, as well as two Champions League titles with Barcelona, it came as a shock when he hailed the then unemployed Marcelo Bielsa as ‘the best manager in the world’. (Farrel, 2017).
Bielsa has won the Argentine top flight three times, twice with Newell’s Old Boys and once with Velez Sarsfield. He won Olympic Gold with Argentina, and has been runner up in the Copa Del Rey and Europa League with Bilbao, and runner up in the Libertadores with Newell’s. Affectionately known as ‘El Loco’, Bielsa is something of a cult hero in the world of football and his influence on the game is far greater than his CV or trophy cabinet would suggest
Perhaps the greatest reflection of his mythos is his apodo - El Loco, or the crazy one. Bielsa’s craziness can be seen on and off the pitch, with his bizarre tactics and obsessive approach to training, as well as his feuds with club owners, and his colourful personality.
Career
Bielsa has had an interesting career in (football) Management. He began in Newell’s Old Boys, a team based in his hometown of Rosario. He then spent the mid 90s at different Mexican clubs before returning to Argentina to coach Velez Sarsfield. After a brief nine game stint with Espanyol (his first foray into European football) he would get the biggest job in the country - coaching the Argentine national team.
Argentina was the most exciting team going into the 2002 World Cup, with 42 goals in qualification they were favourites to lift the trophy. Despite their successful qualifying campaign and a talented squad, they only managed one win in the group stage and made a premature exit as England and Sweden went onto the next round (Sportskeeda). The effect of the disappointing performance was compounded when Brazil, Argentina’s biggest international rivals went on to lift the trophy for the fifth time. In his final two years he would lose a Copa America final to Brazil in 2003, and win Olympic Gold in 2004 before catching everyone by surprise and quitting because he ‘felt tired’ (CNN). Ultimately his stint with Argentina was not remembered fondly as people thought his side was too attacking, unbalanced and caused his players exert too much physical effort. Another criticism often levelled at him was that his football was so fast paced that it did not allow the more creative players to showcase their talent (Sabbatasso, 2010).
Having disappointed in his homeland, Bielsa went on to accept a job with the Chilean national team after a three year absence from the game. With Chile he had the opportunity to take complete control of the training setup and achieved a series of historic firsts for what was previously an underachieving footballing nation. These first included a first ever qualifying point in Montevideo against Uruguay and the first ever official win against Argentina in 2008. Bielsa’s side qualified for the 2010 World Cup, their first since 1998, but ultimately bowed out to Brazil in the round of 16 (Sportskeeda). Bielsa once again caught everyone by surprise when he quit the job in 2011 because he had personal issues with the incoming president of the Chilean football association. Bielsa began Chile’s golden generation by launching the international careers of Gary Medel, Arturo Vidal and the now record goal scorer Alexis Sanchez. Chile went on to win back-to-back Copa Americas in 2015 and 2016, the first of which was won by Bielsa’s fiercest disciple, Jorge Sampaoli.
Following his stint in Chile, Bielsa would go on to coach Bilbao, turning them into one of the most exciting teams in Europe, but once again left the job after falling out with the board and only just falling short of major silverware. Following Bilbao, he would manage a series of upper-mid-level teams including an infamous two day stint with Lazio. He is now earning his wages in England’s second division with Leeds, and seems to be on the verge of promotion into the premier league. At club level, Bielsa has never had a ‘big job’.
El loco en la cancha
While the way he usually leaves each job certainly helped him earn his nickname, in reality la locura is evidenced in his tactical approach to football, and his obsessive approach to training. Bielsa takes inspiration from dutch total football of the 1970’s. This was a fast paced system based on the idea that players should be able to play in several different positions on the pitch. It is hard to pin down Bielsa’s preferred formation, but we can say his tactical approach is based on a series of ‘fundamentals’ regarding transition from attack to defense, and from defense to attack. His philosophy can be summed up in four words ‘movement, rotation, concentration and improvisation’ (Sportskeeda). When out of possession, Bielsa asks his players to defend as high up the opposition half as possible so as to regain possession close to the other team’s goal. At first he employed a conventional 4-3-3 formation, but his teams were often easy to counter attack against since his fullbacks pushed up and the two centre backs were caught off guard. As a result, the Modern Bielsa lines up defensively with a 3-4-3, or a 3-4-1-2, with a third centre back providing more coverage. To regain possession Bielsa asks all of his players to press intensely, hence the movement, and hence why his style is so physically demanding.
Once possession is won, his team transitions into an unconventional 3-3-1-3, which was best evidenced by his Chile team. This transition requires perfect synchronization on behalf of his players, and oftentimes if the press means a player is out of position, another can easily fill in the spot (Sabbatasso, 2010). The second line of three is unconventional in and of itself, as it is usually composed of two wide players (wingbacks) and a central midfielder. In football, a midfield line of three is usually composed of three central midfielders. Bielsa asks his wingbacks to be wide, but his more offensive wingers begin in more central positions, meaning that the attacking three is more narrow than the midfield three (Sportskeeda). When the wingers drift wide, and wingbacks cut in creating and vice versa. This creates a chaotic offensive maneuver which always has a numerical advantage in the wings.
An important part of the transition from defense to attack is ball movement, which is why he has often placed a central midfielder in the center of his defensive line. He did this with Gary Medel in Chile and Javi Martinez at Bilbao to great effect. Medel has almost exclusively played at centre back for Chile since, and Javi Martinez was occasionally used at center backs by both Heynckes and Guardiola at Bayern. Bielsa emphasises rotation in the sense that players are invited to move out of position to confuse opposing defences, and teammates are expected to cover. This is most often seen when wingbacks push forwards and centre mids cover for them.
This system of organised chaos requires meticulous preparation. Bielsa’s players undergo a great deal of on the ball training as well as fitness preparation. Bielsa devotes much of each training session to teaching tactics. He himself is known to watch thousands of hours of video footage of football matches, and his own training sessions in order to improve his side (Gault 2015). Despite the fact that this system requires incredible athletic prowess, extreme flexibility and above average tactical intelligence on behalf of the players, when in a new job Bielsa makes no alterations to his model based on the players he has (Tighe, 2015).
Influence
Among his disciples, Bielsa boasts not only Guardiola and Sampaoli, but also Diego Simeone, Mauricio Pochettino and Marcelo Gallardo. All of these coaches have borrowed one of Bielsa’s unconventional tactical strategies and combined them with more conventional ones to achieve great success. For example, Guardiola also emphasizes ball movement, and he too has used centre midfielders in the defensive line (Mascherano at Barcelona, Martinez at Bayern and Fernandinho at Man City). That said, while it is possession dominant, Guardiola’s side is slightly more structured and slow paced. While Bielsa’s players often switch positions all over the pitch, Guardiola’s team only do so in specific scenarios (usually the final third). Pochettino also emphasises intense pressing while defending, but he too employs a much more structured system while attacking. Gallardo’s River Plate often employs the strategy of having central midfielders cover for attacking full backs.
In this sense, Bielsa’s football is pure spectacle and unconventional in every way. Bielsa is an innovator all over the pitch and that is why he draws so much praise from his colleagues, who resorted to convention to win titles. His legend goes beyond pure tactics though. Bielsa reminds us of the more romantic side of football. He never coached any of the Buenos Aires based ‘big teams’ in Argentina, and fell just short of winning South America’s biggest title. With Chile he laid the foundations for the success of his two successors. He led an all-basque, young Bilbao side to a Europa League final, and with Leeds he is on the verge of bringing a once great club back to the English top-flight for the first time in well over a decade. Bielsa is not a legend because of his medals, but because he is probably the only person everyone can agree loves football more than they do.
Gianni is a half Italian, half Chilean incoming third year Political Economy student. He loves his dog, football and politics.
Bibliography
https://bleacherreport.com/articles/1381408-why-marcelo-bielsa-employ-the-most-bizarre-tactics-in-football
https://www.goal.com/en-gb/news/pep-guardiola-hails-marcelo-bielsa-as-best-in-the-world/1ird9awpucie41px3ixlkx81g8
https://www.sportskeeda.com/football/football-tactics-marcelo-bielsa-s-career-football-formations-explained
https://bleacherreport.com/articles/398547-chile-marcelo-bielsa