Argentina football coach Alfino Basile always says that he is simply not interested in winning alone, it matters to him how the victory is accomplished. By saying that he was suggesting Argentina should always follow traditional South American style of play and give continuity to sublime soccer. Millions of football fans around the globe keep themselves busy in debate of practical football vs beautiful football time and again. This debate is resurfaced again between Argentine fans and Brazilian fans because of Copa America finals with former accusing latter for not truely following the traditional South American style of play and not giving continuity to sublime soccer.
The powerhouses of South American football - Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay are countries of immigrants and football arrived there with the flood of immigrants. Football helped them bind together, for example when Uruguay won 1930 world cup more than half the population were immigrants. The South Americans developed a form of play which was both beautiful and effective. They attracted international recognition with their spread out, free flowing play and intricate passing and football became absolutely vital for their identity. But their technique did not go unchallanged for long especially after development of more physical,defensive and counter attacking football by Europeans.
Beautiful football (as purists suggest but critics says it is more romantic than beautiful and less pragmatic these days) became more and more toothless in later years. Purists fondly remember and never get tired of talking about Holland of 74 & 78, Brazil of 82 & 86, France of 86 and Argentina of 06 but the sad part of the story is none of them won the coveted trophy. The Brazilian "dream team" of 82 world cup exhibited sublime and most artistic way to play soccer. Their game was highly praised all around even though they did not win the trophy. They tried same thing in 86 but success deserted them again and when they were once again fruitless in 90, they were ridiculed with sarcasm even by South Americans. Failing to produce results with the so called "pure football" Brazil finally abandoned it and adopted some European (mainly German and Italian) tricks, which showed immediate effect and brought them success in 94. Since then Brazil has established themselves as world beaters, adding another world cup in 02 and four more Copa America trophies. Argentina who claim to play beautiful football has not won anything after 93 Copa America title.
The catastrophic debacle of Argentina in recently concluded Copa America final has now raised more questions against purists. Was the loss just because the players failed to perform to their potential ( Argentina looked lot stronger in paper) or was it due to poor planning ? Do romantic football really has firepower in its tank for eminence ? Is playing certain style of football is more important than winning matches ? Can Basile turn the wheel back to establish romantic football in 21st century ? The answer can go either way and people of opposite sects can argue for hours,days or years on this but right now, Man of the moment and winner is Brazilian Coach Dunga, who thinks it is important to make tactical changes to keep winning and believes changes are inevitable. Dunga at post final conference advocated the importance of win being much more important than any style of play. He said " We came to rescue the self-esteem of the Brazilian workers who wakes up in the morning and returns home late at night, whose only satisfaction in life is seeing Brazil win a football match"
8 comments:
I would go for the beautiful football (I wont call it romantic though since it may mean fanciful) since only hitting the ball into the net cannot be considered a true sportmanship. (Anyway, your description was great and made me feel as if I was listening to some commentary after some great grand finale).
Very very nice description. The good one among the blogs that i read for quite a time.
ya its always nice to see good and amazing football(soccer)and the team will always finish on the loosing side. We can take the example of Holland and Argentina(recent years).
However, how good opponent plays does not count on long term just what counts is who win the game.
The beautiful passing game is like that if you were able to get one break you can score more as shown by argentina in Copa, WC2006 and Holland a long time ago may be in '94.
In my opinion the team manager has important role. I found one game between Croatia and Germany in '94 or '98 that craotia score 3 goals and didnot allow the german team to sit on the game. They played superb football and the highlights was the tactics they changed quite a bit in that particular game. They used short pass for 15/20 minutes and they changed to long pass for another 15/20 minutes.
That's the capability the manager should have.
Erickson, Ranieri( former chelsea and now Juventus coach) were reknowned with these type of tactics. But Erickson showed ..... with england team.
Its too long sorry ...
any way good description.Being a futball fan loved it very much.
Good Luck !!!
yeah..
it had been long time since i have had such a quality post to read.
Of course it is important to score in football but not in price of beauty of the game. here my defination of beauty means fair, sportive and stylish game with lots of flair and need not necessarily be a brand of style ( one touch passes of south americans, force n pace of England or Iron-Walled Defense of Italy).
Sport is great leveller and there are always mixed emotions,pain n anguish, regrets n estascy, belief n ability, form n fitness, passion n pride. And at the end, the thing that has lasting effect is the essence of the game. Yet what matters is Final Score. Thats again one the beauties of the game but not all.
So wht with the 0-0 result,the Champions League semifinal (2nd leg) between Arsenal n Real Madrid of 05/06 season was most entertaining draw I could ever witness n the game was not boring even for a fraction of a second.
If we go back to WC06, many argue Argentina was best team n i agree, but many also argue Argentina was playing only stylish game n they lacked results, something similar happend to Arsenal last season , they completed double aganint ManU, drew with Chealse, beat Livpool ( even 6-0 n 4-0 in Carling and FA cup) yet finished only 4th behind all three teams bcos they could not finish the job aganist small teams aftr hitting the posts with no luck or dribbling the ball inside D-area without proper finish.But both ARG in WC06 or Arsenal last season played breathtaking football n produced best moments of tournament/league.
Now, I dont really remember what happened in final of WC06 ( oh i do the head-butt of Zidane) but i distinctly remember how ARG put the ball into the nets aftr 26 passes or one piece of magic n brillience put by Maxi RodrÃguez ( that back volley on the top corner of nets)n Tomas Risiscky's (tht 40 yard long shot aganist USA).
It could yet be argued, ARG did not win 06WC bcos they stuck to their basic style of game but then who won the Cup of Glory, ITALY. Didnt they stuck to their own style of play , painfully slow and defensive, their very own virtue in any ground of world. Histroy has proved again and again that any team has been more successful when they played their natural game. So, a kid in Brazil or Argentina grows up dribbling a ball and doing magic tricks while another in England tries to hit the ball into nets by a distance of 60 yards. And these natural instincts can not be changed easily when they are grown up. So a striker from Italy could play on mid defense and last defense of Brazil could be seen inside the D-area of opponents.
These things will always remain as long as guys are kicking the soccer around the globe n wont change with no. of viewers increased, amount of money added or with the raise of expectations. After all DUNIA GOAL HAI.
Ultimately, the output is important.....
Game is not an abstract art. A student with beautiful handwriting is nothing in front of a successful one who always get grade 'A".......The playing style is just a worst effort to gather sympathy from the spectators, knowing that they are certain to lose the game............
And in the game there are already a set of rules and regulations (othewise there will be penalty). So, to win the game within this boundary is itself a great art..........
I do agree with reference's comments. Imagine, if you were supporting a team which played skillfully but still lost, you may find some consolations for yourself saying that they played well...but still you wished your team had won (which matters in the end) and makes a good scoop for the newspapers the following day.
Anyways, for a change...appreciate the article though.....really liked it..
Dramatic plays in soccer give the game spirit. I think the European style is down to business and brutal. I think they sometimes pick up a few rugby skills and weave them into the game. "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder".We give too much credit to the players themselves for their gifts.
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