Total football - what does it mean? To understand how the football revolutionary Rinus Michels influenced the development of the most popular ball game, a little excursion into history, a description of the methods of modern followers of the great Dutch coach, and determination of the deep essence and meaning of this phenomenon will help.
Definition
Many young fans are interested in what is total football? In fact, the meaning of this game model is already enclosed in the name itself. In short, the essence is as follows - everyone attacks, everyone defends.
Total football provides for the abandonment of frozen ossified tactical schemes, suggests the universalism of all field players from the defender to the attacker. During the possession of the ball by the team, defense players are actively connected to the attack, without fear for the rear. If necessary, even the central defender must be able to break into free zones and hit on goal.
In this case, one of the midfield players closes his position, pulling himself back and securing his partner.
Total defense in football is built on the same principle - forwards and midfielders participate in the selection of the ball, creep in tackles, go to their goal, actively helping their defenders. In general, defensive actions begin immediately after the loss of the ball. The whole team is included in the pressure, making it difficult for the opponent a simple way out of his half of the field. The only effective remedy for this is a long pass, but this is fraught with getting into an offside position.
Background
A wave of total football swept the planet in the seventies of the twentieth century. The recognized father of this model of the game is considered the coach of the Netherlands and Amsterdam Ajax Rinus Michels. However, the basic principles were developed by the coach of the legendary Hungarian national team Gustav Shebes.
Later this idea was developed and brought to mind by an English specialist Jack Reynolds, who worked at Ajax in the forties. Rinus Michels played under his leadership and borrowed the achievements of his mentor, eventually creating the famous model of total football. For the first time he demonstrated in public his brainchild, leading the Amsterdam Ajax.
Dream Team
The team, recently composed of semi-professional players, in a brilliant style won the main continental club tournament - the European Cup.
Mikhels was appointed coach of the national team, and in 1974 the orange team struck the imagination of specialists accustomed to static, frozen game models. The Netherlands did not win that World Cup, losing in the final to the German national team, but the football revolution was recognized as taking place. The main role in that legendary team was played by Johan Cruyff, who did not have a specific position on the field and confused the opponents' defenders, moving around the field.
Tactics and Strategy
The player’s formal position in total football does not really matter. Football players are constantly moving on the field, confusing the opponent and introducing confusion into his defensive order. Extreme defenders in such a formation actively plow their flank, equally participating in both defense and attack. At the same time, they are still obliged to shift to the center as necessary, in order to maximize the saturation of the attack zone.
Forwards do not have the right to cool at the forefront. Their responsibilities include participating in collective defense, they must immediately attack opponents after losing the ball and make it difficult to start an attack. Also, the forwards cannot passively wait for the transfer, they must step back to participate in ball control, free up areas for breakthroughs of midfield players and even defense.
Players are required to provide a numerical advantage at a particular moment on any part of the field, actively move around, replacing each other and not focusing on the pre-match arrangement of players.
Tactical scheme in total football
The outstanding coach Valery Lobanovsky was furious at the questions about how many clean forwards should be let out on the field. According to him, every soccer player who finds himself in the attack zone must take on the functions of an attacker and shoot on goal on his own. The number of attacking players in a given zone should not be dictated by the pre-match arrangement, but by the current situation on the field.
According to the philosophy of Lobanovsky, everyone should be a universal, be able to hand out transfers and hit on goal, lay in tackles and select balls. This is the essence of this model of the game, in which there is no firm attachment to the position where the players act as a team in defense and attack.
However, the classic tactical scheme of total football is the arrangement of the Dutch at the world championship - 1974 - 4x4x4. Its essence lies in the presence of wingers, which during attacks actively shift to the center, making room for flank breakthroughs of extreme defenders and midfielders.
The necessary conditions
Total football is a very effective weapon, but difficult to use and use. To select the ideal performers for this model, it is necessary to observe a number of mutually exclusive paragraphs.
The foundation of total football is the excellent functional readiness of the players. They must be ready to be in motion throughout the match, participate in the selection of the ball in all sections of the field, accelerate through the entire field. In other words, performers must be real athletes.
However, it’s not enough to pick up physically strong, hardy football players. An even more important factor is the ability to play short and medium passes. Artists in all lines, from defense to attack, must have impeccable technique, be able to distribute programs under conditions of severe pressure from the opponents, and be proficient in the art of one-touch play. As practice shows, low and well-coordinated players act best in this way. Transmission in total football is another prerequisite.
With the naked eye, the glaring contradiction between the two fundamental principles of this beautiful, but very difficult model of the game is noticeable.
Find balance
As mentioned above, the ideal performers for a team playing total football at the same time should have the speed characteristics of a sprinter, the physical power of the decathlete and the technique of Lionel Messi in addition.
It is physically impossible to fulfill all these mutually exclusive conditions in practice; therefore, great coaches who borrow certain elements of total football select an individual game model based on the qualities of the players available.
So the stars have formed that in the legendary Dutch national team of the seventies an insanely talented generation was selected, in which the magnificent Johan Cruyff ruled everything.
The followers of Rinus Michels had to build their tactics, working with existing players and solve their own conflicting tasks dictated by his model of the game.
Tiki taka
Teams that practice the tactics of total football are considered to be Barcelona by Josep Guardiola and Kiev Dynamo from the time of Valery Lobanovsky. At the same time, the difference between athletic Kievites and slender Catalans is visible to the naked eye.
Based on the capabilities of his players, Josep Guardiola in his own way built the game of his team. His incredibly technical, but low-level players are simply unable to physically play at top speeds for all ninety minutes of the match. In order not to accelerate the pace, he built the game of his club on a shallow margin in the center of the field, in which absolutely all players participate, including the goalkeeper.
Having seized the ball, Guardiola's pets passed it to each other, incredibly exhausting the opponents, who were forced to spend most of the time in the selection. At the same time, they maintained a fairly low pace of the game, exploding from time to time and sharpening the game. This style was called "tiki-taka" and was successfully used by the coaches of the Spanish national team, which won three major tournaments in a row.
Reinforced concrete Lobanovsky
Kiev Dynamo Valery Lobanovsky was at the opposite pole from Barcelona with Messi, Iniesta and Xavi in the squad. His fighters were physically strong and athletic players, capable of jerking 40-50 meters throughout the match. Nevertheless, Lobanovsky is also considered a classic of total football, he simply interpreted and implemented this model of the game in his own way.
Unlike the Catalans, the people of Kiev preferred playing in the middle and long pass, rarely resorting to a small oversupply and longitudinal passes. Their skate was the instant transition of the whole team from defense to attack and vice versa. Extreme defenders in a matter of seconds covered the distance from their own penalty box to someone else's, the central midfielders burst into free zones and scored goals, forwards were pulled back and tackled balls. That is, interchangeability worked, each player had to have the skills to play defense and attack.
The main sign of Lobanovsky’s teams was suffocating pressure. Depending on the opponent’s power, they applied either high pressure, joining the attack already in the alien half of the field, or retreated and acted as a compact group in their half.
Today, all the teams in the world to one degree or another profess the principles of total football. The game of personal guardianship, the firm binding of performers to a certain position has long sunk into eternity. The Michels affair is alive and well to this day.