So. I like the statement of intent, wrapping up deals for the powerful, physical striker Olivier Giroud; for the talented and tricky striker cum winger Lukas Podolski; and, it seems, for the crafty, tactical winger/attacking midfielder Santi Cazorla.

Those are all signs of intent from Arsenal to become a real force in the Premier League and a real threat to win cups and titles. But…

Anyone else notice that their biggest problem last season was at fullback?

And while Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger has been busy stocking his team with more tricky attackers, Newcastle locked down a deal for French right back Mathieu Debuchy, Barcelona signed left back Jordi Alba, and Manchester United has the inside line on Everton’s Leighton Baines, who can patrol the entire left flank like a young Roberto Carlos.

Arsenal had better do something or they really will miss that Champion’s League spot this coming season.

Sam Allardyce, who currently manages newly promoted English team, West Ham United, comes in for a lot of stick.

He coaches his teams to play ugly soccer. To play ‘route one’ or long ball soccer, where the ball is simply launched towards a big guy near the opposition goal in hopes of causing some havoc and getting a lucky break.

No creativity, just boring, blunt force. Nothing attractive to watch or cheer for.

In short, it’s the emblem of the worst stereotypes of the English game.

But I don’t think it’s fair.

When ‘Big Sam’ managed Bolton in the first half of the noughties, for a time, he had his team playing the most exciting, attacking soccer around. Because he had two skillful attackers in Jay-Jay Okocha and Youri Djorkaeff.

Okocha was the heartbeat of one of the Nigerian national team, a talented ‘no. 10’ who directed the attack for club and country.

Djorkaeff played on the 1998 World Cup winning French squad alongside Zidane. He played behind a lone striker for both France and Bolton, drifting from side to side like a (not very speedy) ‘floating winger’ or ‘central winger.’

Allardyce gave both of these players a free reign in midfield and attack. Yes, he had ‘boring’ bulldozer of striker upfront to feed off the delicious efforts of Okocha and Djorkaeff and a pretty boring midfield behind them, but the efforts of his two ‘fantasistas’ made Bolton’s games amazing viewing.

What I believe Allardyce does is get the best out of the players available to him. After that Bolton team, he never really had those kinds of players on his squad. If the West Ham ownership were to give him sufficient funds to not only shore the most pressing needs, but also buy a creative, luxury player (Aston Villa might be ready to ditch Charles N’Zogbia), I think you would see him put out a much more interesting side. What he doesn’t do is ask players to play beyond their abilities.

Their central midfield will be picked from: Steven Gerrard, Gareth Barry, Frank Lampard, and Scott Parker.

All players worthy of being on that plane (except maybe Barry).

All over 30.

There is Phil Jones, who is listed as a defender, but can also play as a defensive midfielder, but ultimately lacks the right kind of positional sense for that role and would probably be overrun by the opposition. And James Milner, who can play as an attack minded central midfielder, but is more likely to play as a defensive minded winger.

So, not a single likely starter under thirty.

Like it or not, you’re not going to win a major international tournament without more youth, because those legs will get tired if they make it out of their group.

I don’t care how long the rumors go on. I don’t think he’ll go to Manchester United and if he does, I think it will go badly.

Why? Because Sneijder can’t play in 4-4-2.

If you play him in the middle, you put too much pressure on his partner to perform all the defensive duties (because he’s not at all suited to doing much defense work himself). Or else you require the outside midfielders to come inside frequently to provide defensive support in the middle. The first option leaves the midfield in danger of being overrun, plus leaves a big gap between the central midfielders and no good way to connect them and just generally leaves the team  unbalanced and with easy to exploit holes. The second option completely wastes the primary talents of the team’s best outside midfielders, who bring pace, width, and direct running and also requires a complete reworking on the team’s focus on speed on the outside.

If you play Sneijder on the outside, you lose speed on the wings and also put a lot of pressure on the full back, who will be tasked with covering that flank while Sneijder invariably goes on walkabout in the center of the park, instead of covering the outside.

Basically, you have to play him centrally behind a lone striker.

Wayne Rooney can absolutely play that role, but is Danny Welbeck, rising star of the Manchester attack ready to be relegated to the bench? He’s a rising player for England with a good chance of representing his country at the European Championships and he’s worked his way into a starting role for his team. But there’s no room for him if Sneijder is playing, except as a sub or on the flanks. So how long before he starts looking to leave? So in return for getting a 28 going on 29 year old midfielder with 2-3 more years at the top of his game, you will probably lose a rising striker who can be a key player for the next decade.

Sneijder belongs in Italy, where the classic playmaker is still used.

Just as an excuse to write and/or show off and/or be shamelessly indulgent, today we’re writing about a cool terms in soccer. These aren’t technical terms or anything devoted to rules, but more about tactics and tactical roles.

Fantasista…
A fantasista is a creative attacking player, either a striker or a central attacking midfielder. This is the kind of player you build your team around. In fact, you have to, because a fantasista is mostly useless otherwise. The fantasista brings ‘fantasy’ to the game, but with the fantasy usually comes a certain unpredictability and even unreliability. A coach must build the team around the fact the fantasista will tend to wander around and do whatever they feel like and will almost never defend. The rest of the team, ironically, must be very disciplined to account for the fantasista’s undisciplined nature. That’s why you don’t tend to see them on the wing, because they’ll wander into the middle and leave that side of the field exposed (Zidane did ostensibly play on the left for Real Madrid at times, but that was when their left full back was the incomparable Roberto Carlos, who could motor up and down the left side of the field at speed for the entire game and generally play the role of left fullback and left midfielder to account for the fact that Zidane would never stay where a left midfielder is generally supposed to stay). These days, you’ll tend to either see a fantasista playing as a ‘second striker’ with a free role behind the main striker or as a ‘false nine’ – playing as the primary striker, but with freedom to drop deep or go wide and not, as a number nine (the traditional number of a team’s primary striker) usually does lurking near the goal (Francesco Totti and Lionel Messi are protptypical of the latter kind of fantasistas). The reason for this positioning is that their tactical freedom generally requires the coach to put two disciplined central midfielders behind to both do the dirty work the fantasista won’t and to plug to holes in their own formation left by the teammate’s wanderings. For example, if a fantasista decided to drop deep into the midfield for a while, then another player would actually need to move higher up the field to bridge the space between the midfield and the striker or even (if the the fantasista is playing as ‘false nine’ without another central striker) move temporarily into the striker role.

Trivote…
Trivote refers to playing three in central midfield, but also to the kind of roles those players perform. A 4-3-3, 4-5-1, and a 4-2-3-1 all, after a fashion, have three central midfielders, but a trivote really refers to when all of the three have significant defensive responsibilities. In a 4-2-3-1, the central player in the ‘3’ generally does not drop too far into the midfield to help out in a attack. As part of a trivote, one player may have more attacking and less defensive responsibilities, but all are expected to pitch in regularly.

Trequartista…
The word literally means ‘three quarter-er.’ If you divided the field into four parts, the trequartista lurks in the third of those parts, just behind where the striker(s) would play. The player is similar to a fantasista (and most of the best trequartistas would also be considered fantasistas) in that role is a central one behind one or two strikers. This is the classic ‘number ten’ role of the main engine of the attack. The player rarely helps much in defense, so also needs a couple of more defensive minded players behind him or her to compensate. What this means is that a trequartista is generally only seen when a team plays with a single central striker (which allows for a two man central midfield behind the player) or with two strikers in a 4-3-1-2. The 4-3-1-2 works with a trequartista linking the three central midfielders to the attack. Of the three, one plays in a deep role and the other two operate as ‘shuttlers’ and are expected to be very tactically aware, with a responsibility to help out in defense, to move wide (especially if the full back attacks, to make sure opposing players can’t exploit the space behind the fullback), to attack, and generally plug any tactical hole on their side of the field.

Regista
The modern regista, a position which has been coming back into fashion lately, evolved from the sweeper role as envisioned by the great Franz Beckenbauer. Essentially, this player is a deep lying playmaker. They generally sit fairly deep and are responsible for helping keep possession and launch attacks from their own half of the field, with the most important attributes being a certain coolness and calmness in possession and the ability to hit accurate long balls. The regista has defensive responsibilities, but how those are interpreted varies. Sometimes a regista takes on responsibilities like man marking and tackling (Xabi Alonso or Bastian Schweinsteiger, for example); others won’t tackle much, but will use their understanding to make interceptions, but see their main role as helping keep possession and ping accurate passes around the field from deep positions (Andrea Pirlo or even late career Paul Scholes can be seen as this variety); finally, some registas don’t offer much traditional defense, but are experts at keeping hold of the ball and provide defense support simply by making it harder for the opposition to get a hold of the ball, with this type generally playing higher up the field, closer to the center circle (Xavi Hernandez is the quintessential example of this kind).

Less Cool Soccer Terms – Holding & Defensive Midfielders
This is case where a very real argument could be made that I am making a wholly pointless and artificial distinction. Nevertheless, I do see that distinction being made, so will attempt to explain it as I see it. Both are intended to provide cover in front of the defense, but a player dispatched to play a holding role is less likely to see that role as one handing out crunching tackles than of intercepting the ball and playmaking from deep (the best holding midfielders would also be classified as registas, depending on their range of passing and importance to the team’s attack). Someone tasked with being a defensive midfielder is less likely to jump start the attack, except in the most basic sense of passing it to someone who will launch an attack, and more likely to see their role much more in terms of disrupting opposition play than building up their own team’s play. Holding players still tackle and defensive players can still launch longer balls into attack, but not so much as their counterpart. Sir Alex Ferguson, coach of Manchester United, has tended to view his central midfield pairing differently – ‘passers’ and ‘runners’ is how it is often described. Instead of looking at how they view their defensive responsibilities, it is more about their movement. ‘Runners’ run up and down the field, both joining the attack and helping in defense. This player will be more likely to deliver tackles and proactively try to disrupt the opposition, but will do it more by chasing. And rather than making long, hail mary passes downfield, are more likely to run with the ball into the attack. A ‘passer’ is more passive, both providing good passes, both long and short, and moving more deliberately to either place themselves in opposition passing lanes to intercept the other team’s passes or to place themselves in a position to be safety valve for their teammates – someone they can easily find and easily pass the ball to if they find themselves under pressure and are in danger of losing possession.

The great soccer player, Giorgio Chinaglia, has died. He was a terrible scoundrel, but a loveable one.

Freddy Adu was the wunderkind of American soccer, but unlike fellow (one time) youthful superstar Landon Donovan, Adu has failed to really produce on the big stage (without getting into the question of Donovan’s failure to star in Europe – because his achievements in MLS, for the USMNT, and during his brief spells with Everton far outstrip what Adu has accomplished).

In truth, Adu looks like something closer to Clint Mathis. Mathis was an outrageously talented attacker whose attitude cost him the best years of his career.

He finally came through good when an injury to Real Salt Lake’s #10, Javier Morales, forced the coach to put Mathis in the game as their playmaker. Mathis played with heart and skill and Salt Lake won. He retired soon after.

But Mathis had the talent to break through with big European club and be a go to player for the national team, but he squandered both opportunities.

Adu seems aware of the risks to his career, but has also wasted many of the years when he might have been progressing or developing.

But I still remember watching him play for the national team during the last Gold Cup.

Since the retirement of Claudio Reyna, the national team has featured a midfield based around counterattacking wingers (Donovan, Shea, Dempsey) and athletic, muscular central midfielders. Most of our players attack by powerful surges  towards the opposing goal. Not to say that they can’t be creative, but it’s about motion, speed, and drive.

What I saw Adu bring was patience. If a move started to break down, players could pass him the ball and he could hold it and keep possession while his teammates re-oriented themselves. He then had the vision and creativity to try and unlock the opposition and start another attack. Without him, the team is usually forced to bring the ball back deep before re-starting, whereas Adu seemed comfortable keeping the ball higher up the pitch.

More recently, he was practically the only player on the U.S. Olympic team that can hold his head up high after the team failed to qualify for the London Olympics. He delivered delicious balls to the attackers and virtually every move went through him.

Donovan and Dempsey both making slashing runs, cutting in from the wings using timing and quick first step to get into attacking positions, but neither is the sort of player who controls to tempo of a game.

Coach Jurgen Klinsmann has been trying to incorporate and more attacking, possession oriented style to the national team. Surely Adu has to be part of that now?