"Negative Football"

It says on here that it's only been 6 days since I last posted, although it feels like it's been longer. Anyway, the other day I was having this "twitter debate" with this person (no idea who it was, avatar was a football club badge). I'll just assume it was a kid, or a bored adult who's trolling by searching the name of his club (when they aren't even playing) and talking shit to people. But yeah, I had this tweet saying that with the absence of fan attendance, what exactly is the point of watching certain clubs. I basically was referring to the clubs from Wolves down in the table, as well as West Ham. I wanted to add Arsenal to that so badly, but the FA Cups in recent years would easily detract from my point of no trophies. later, I somewhat amended the tweet by adding Everton and Spurs, especially if they don't win any trophies under the world class managers they're currently employing.

First thing I noticed is it's difficult to debate anything over twitter, literally and figuratively. On the literal side, it's simply as hassle trying to word things in whatever character limit they have. Also, there's the obvious lack of context with the other user if you don't know them. On the more abstract front, and I've actually already written about this, is the lack of "agree to disagree", or having people use facts rather than feelings or opinions. Case in point here is the title of this article. I lumped West Ham into the category of teams that play negative football, as that's what it is. Call it bias, or trolling, or delusion, but this individual was adamant that Moyes does not have his team playing negative football. I don't want to rehash the whole thing, as it's pointless, but it's like, I wonder how different people "down the pub" or whatever think about football compared to those that actually watch it. I mean, personally, I struggle at times to watch the Premier League, especially entire games. I wonder if people like that just watch "their" team, or if they watch most games on a given matchday. I assume it's the former, because so many opinions I see are off the mark. Oh, and two other amusing general points from that "debate" were that Salah is apparently a traditional winger, and the best in the world. Also, that Diafra Sakho had a "good season" in 2015/16, despite scoring 5 goals in 21 appearances. For context, "flops" Haller and Hernandez had better scoring ratios than that Sakho season. My take on that is the "rose tinted glasses" are out in full force, or that person was just saying whatever to act like the argument was legit. But yeah, the Salah thing... This one did irritate me because anyone that watches Liverpool and knows anything about the sport realizes he's not a traditional winger. At best, he's a "wide forward" using FM terms. Like, the audacity not to recognize this while at the same time trying to lecture me on what type of tactics Moyes uses at West Ham. Funny shit. The other funny part was saying Burnley and Newcastle play "bad football", yet Wolves apparently don't. And then excusing that by saying that Nuno's squad is weak, so it's fine to play bad football (18 games played, 19 goals), despite the fact that they spent in the summer on random players and chose to have a small squad.

This brings be back to the somewhat "rhetorical" question, what exactly is the point? I've made it clear many times that I'm a Mourinho guy, but at the same time I recognize the limitations on how he sets up, as well as the short shelf life a guy like him (and Conte) has at each club. You have one or two seasons of getting the players on board, willing to suffer and all that, play reactive football, maybe win something or other, and then the players revolt because they realize it's some BS. It worked better before social media and agent/player power were such forces in the game, when players played for the shirt and all that. My point here is the football isn't inherently good, but when you win, that doesn't matter. That's at the top level, by the way, and my tweet was referring to clubs not in the position to win anything, ever. I'm not gonna go back and look at when all the aforementioned teams last won a trophy (if ever), but that's kinda the point of the sport, to win. If you have no chance to win, in theory, it's at least a place to have fun with your friends and maybe get drunk. But now, that doesn't happen. The football's dire, you're watching at home without your friends, and the club prioritizes staying in the league over actually trying to win a cup.

Two that kinda have an excuse, I guess, are Brighton and Sheffield United, in that the former is trying to play "good football" but the players are bad, and the latter had a great season last campaign but various factors see them last in the league. You could also excuse West Brom, I suppose, since they aren't rich and weren't overly exciting (compared to Leeds) last season. At the same time, they have some decent players, technically, and Big Sam is now there, so that sucks. I was mainly lumping in Wolves, Burnley, West Brom, Palace, West Ham, and Newcastle. Fulham could be in there as well, especially with the boring nature of the club (family stand, anyone?), but they're actually okay to watch compared to the others. I mean, you look at Leeds, Southampton, and Villa, and those clubs are all fun to watch. Villa, yes, have spent, but to be fair they had to last season as I've already mentioned. The first two in particular are the result of awesome coaches getting the best out of bad to average players. And that's my issue with Palace, West Ham and Wolves. They all have some decent players, but due to style of play and recruitment, the football's just dreadful.

There are specific issues for each. Palace have an old squad that needed refreshing 2 seasons ago, as well as a manager that could've retired a number of years ago. West Ham (a club I've written about) haven't had a positive goal difference since 2015/16, and even then they conceded 51 in 38 games. That's not THAT bad, considering they were 7th, but they were only 4 points off a Champions League place. Since then, the club's just been floating in mediocrity. My personal take is their style of play will catch up, as I don't think they're better than Arsenal or level with Chelsea (or even Villa), so another mid-table finish with nothing to play for towards the end of the season is what I expect. Wolves is a weird one, in that they haven't had a legitimate Raul Jimenez backup since he's joined, and the somewhat freak injury to him is a worse-case scenario. However, the rest of the squad is also lacking depth, so that's a personnel issue rather than "luck". Pretty much the whole "spine" is a player away from imploding. You see it when Dendoncker isn't available, as well as Boly/Coady, and obviously Raul. I suppose Marcal was meant to help at CB, particularly in the back three, but still, MGW was loaned out and Otasowie has only begun playing in the first team this season. You then have Cutrone up front, who was also on loan, and 18 y/o Fabio Silva, who wasn't even 2nd or 3rd choice at Porto. The common theme with all these teams is certain types of players will succeed, and that's due to the style. Rice at West Ham is one. He looks amazing because they defend in a deep block. Same with Adama and Neto when Wolves are able to sit back and counter, due to their dribbling ability and pace. Zaha at Palace is another obvious beneficiary of the "negative" style of football, and even he struggles at times due to the anti-football of Roy Hodgson.

Last thing I'll say here is a devil's advocate point. I get that it's a game, and the goal is to win. However, you get three points for a win and one for a draw, and over the course of a season, and being able to score WILL inevitably result in wins. Being able to defend, or focusing all your effort on stifling the opponent, will more often than not result in draws. Also, it'll usually come down to moments of brilliance or mistakes, and better players/players that are confident with the ball will prevail. If the goal is to finish 17th or higher each season so the business can bring in the Premier League check, that's one thing, but I'm not sure why fans should be content with that. I'm often thankful that I didn't grow up over there because it must be horrible being stuck with a club with no ambition, playing dead football, milking the customers... I mean fans, for cash. I'd say each weekend, depending on who's playing, I'll avoid three or four of the games because they'll just be trash. I realize this happens in other leagues as well, but the PL gets so much cash and hype that the product should be a bit better.