I actually think our midfield is fine mate, in terms of the deep lying players. I think, especially with Garner, Tim, Gueye, and for now Mangala that these players can get on the ball and look to start things, but then the out ball is quite often the full backs. And lets be honest, ours aren't comfortable taking the ball in tight spaces and effortlessly finding a blue shirt. This is one of the biggest reasons we've struggled against a press a for a good while now.
To play good progressive football you need all players comfortable on the ball otherwise it breaks down. If all player aren’t then all that happens is the opposite team squeezes and leaves the player who can’t handle the ball in possession and wait for the mistake.
I’ve seen countless good spells of Everton possession under numerous managers go out to Coleman who ends up shanking it down the line or botching the pass infield, or Gueye plays a suicide ball across midfield that gets intercepted.
If we want to play that way then we need to take Keane Coleman Gueye Doucoure and probably Calvert Lewin out the line up and replace them with technical players. We then need to ensure that all the players are also willing to work as hard off the ball as Doucoure Gueye and DCL do.
When you have all 11 comfortable on the ball then the opposition struggle to effectively press and gaps open up or they recognise there’s no point pressing and they drop off meaning you have more possession and more of the ball which is the position City are in now.
Playing progressive football is primarily a product of player quality, it’s not achieved by just ‘wanting’ to do it or ‘having a go’ or ‘being positive’. Football games are not just won solely on desire, you can do it in short bursts but dominance in a match and in possession is largely dictated by player quality, always has been.
Quite simply we do not have enough tactical solutions to dominate territory in football games. We don’t have the pace in defence to play a high line, we don’t have the pace in attack to play on the counter, we don’t have the pace in midfield to close gaps to allow us to play different formations.
We have to sit the defence deep, we can’t leave the front line high as the midfield become stretched so the team has to stay compact. We don’t have the pace to break out of this quickly so we have to hold up slowly, we then don’t have the quality on the ball to build up slowly.
Every tactical option we look at we don’t have the solution to use it in the squad more often than not. We can’t give players more pace, or much better natural technique.
It’s just not as simple as hectoring the manager to ‘go for it’ more like it’s a conscious choice rather than a result of the reality of the players you have. Some people just don’t seem to understand this. Increase the tactical options available to the manager through increasing squad quality and lo and behold you might get your plan B and C in games, you might get your proactive substitutions, you might get a higher percentage of possession and you might get your progressive football.
Asking any manager to get Keane Tarkowski Coleman Gueye Doucoure DCL Beto to play progressive football is just suicide. We need a squad of players who can all handle the football to a certain standard before that is a viable tactical option.
