Risk V Reward: Angel di Maria boasts highest pass rate from high risk attacking passes

Angel di Maria has an incredible successful passing rate of 79.10% which when you consider his style of play makes him the player on the ball most likely to try to unlock a defence.

But that story doesn't sell does it? In the last 24 hours I have been reading reports & twitter feeds about Angel di Maria and the criticism he is receiving for the Opta stats published on various platforms.
They report this as him being the record signing but he's the worst passer. I have two challenges in my mind with this. One being what we already all know in England which is that we our obsessed with criticism and finding what's wrong and not what's right. But more from a technical coaching perspective this is an important topic. 

Working with Elite Cricket

I have actually worked in/with performance analyst for around 10 years of my coaching life. I have been part of seeing how stats affect performance and the interpretation dangers. Working in that industry many of the stats are vital. For example when analysing opposition, as a team you could understand their systems and style of play based on many objective facts produced by organisations like Opta. Also, your analyst can produce vital stats linked to the actual video with product from the like of Prozone & Sportscode. So, what's the problem?
When you spin that success rate of 79.1% success and quote 20.9% failure it and chuck in that it makes you the worse performer in the club it can have a hugely detrimental affect to your game. Firstly lets turn that in to real context. You passed the ball ten times, two of them failed. When you consider the type of player he is, to me that's a non story. In my role I was fortunate to meet performance analyst at many of Europe's top clubs including Bayern Munich, Manchester United, Chelsea and so on. As well as that I did some work in other sports. Rugby is of course a sport that utilises live stats at the top level like ruck, mauls, turnovers etc but the sport that really engrained a thought in my head was cricket. I was fortunate to have met people within the elite performance at the ECB and also at some top level county cricket teams. One guy had gained the view that stats should be very carefully used in order to not have a negative performance affect. He told me that they had a spell where they used to produce the stats and pin them up in the dressing room. One key stats was the success rate of catches. This was meant to highlight performance and ultimately improve standards. However a new stat was being produced. Performance was down. Individual catch success rate went up but overall the teams catches in volume was less. Why? The analyst did two things. Firstly they went to the video and watched every single catch opportunity from training and games which was coded. It now appeared that the attempt to catch was down and also high risk catches were virtually zero. They followed that up with player meetings who confirmed that perhaps, sub consciously or consciously they perhaps were no longer willing to take on higher risk catches because they didn't want to be highlighted to peers and more importantly to management. This after all is their career on the line.

Easy pass v risky pass/cross

Risk V Reward
So, to bring this back to football there is an obvious relationship. When your on the ball does your brain flash back to that stat printed on the notice board saying im the worse passer? Do I recall that paper article saying that im the worse passer and not value for money. Then, I change my game. Well If Angel di Maria simply passes easy, sideways and backwards then is he just another player that Manchester United already have. A deeper controlling midfielder? When reality is he is a player that is looking for ways to constantly break you down with  a dribble, beat someone or a killer pass. This is a high risk strategy and means he also stands a higher risk of mistakes. When you go through the video you see a player that wants to take you on, want's to cross the ball, wants to make a killer pass. If your a defender out their, can I ask you which type of player you would rather player against?

Balanced team

The Spoilers - Great teams need balance of defence & flare

People that know me as a coach know that I have a simple philosophy. A team should be made up of a balanced team and also clever players. You cannot have five di Marias in the team. Of course that wouldn't work. But a team with di Maria and the security of Carrick & Blind behind him. Yes. Ive also said before about this issue within youth recruitment and coaching.
In my experience, I have seen grass roots coaches 'coach' out the individual brilliance of the higher risk naturally attacking players. As a youth coach I seen a greatly talented player completely change. He was 8/9 when I first seen him. He used to skip past people for fun. I seen him again at around 10 and I witnessed the coaches having a go at him. "Stop being greedy, pass it". I then seen him last year and I have to admit, he is now very ordinary and would not be recruited as without the ball he isn't great. But the flare is now gone. So he's neither.
Then on the flip side, Ive seen Elite Academy coaches try to make naturally defensive players attacking 1v1 players. Or only recuiting attacking 1v1 players that do step overs. Its simply balance. I described in my blog http://tonymccool.blogspot.co.uk/2014/06/englands-world-cup-exit-people-passion.html how important the spoiler is and how it frustrates me that we seemingly don't recognise the different strengths and types of players required to make a successful team yet this has been proven over the years. Now we see the topic of some of our great sides not being balanced enough. Too much flare, not defensive minded. Then it will go around again. Too negative, midfielder's don't break lines and take risks. When I hear this I just role my eyes and shake my head because the topic goes round in circles. Maybe I will soon get my chance now at senior level to put my simple philosophy in place. I have to admit, how can a Man Utd find them selves in a situation without top defenders/centre back's, regardless of injuries. Arsenal unable to field a top defensive midfielder and defenders. Arsenal, famously the hardest team to beat in England. The famous back four with the rock in front? That's shocking.
I mentioned clever players. This is because players need to understand the circumstances and dynamics. For example. If Angel di Maria is on the pitch, with ten minutes to go and they are two nil up. Perhaps, I would ask my performance analyst to tell me his retention percentage then. Because the question might be does he change his game based on circumstances? Does he know how to manage a game? Of course that might mean I need to remove him in certain circumstances. However, during the normal course of the game I would want him to take risks? In his position of course.
If a striker scored on average of one goal in four attempts that's a mere 25% success rate. Do you tell him not to shoot any more?

Tony McCool
@antmccool7

My 'E Triple E' - Energy Enthusiasm Empathy & Enjoyment

My new session template

I watched the first Ryan Giggs interview this morning courtesy of Sky Sports News. It lasted around 4-5 Minutes and I took some snippets that he said. Firstly without the surrounding sentences.

"I'll Enjoy" "I've Enjoyed the week" "I'm Gonna Enjoy" "I've enjoyed" "Smiles on fans" "Enjoy Yourselves" (To Players) "Give fans something to smile about" 

He was then asked if he will be installing a 'united' style of play. He said "I want them to play with passion, speed, bravery, imagination and to work hard, most of all, ENJOY it".

He went on to say "As a player I know if I'm enjoying it I can express myself" 

In another statement he said "Wanna see goals, wanna see tackles, wanna see players taking people on, want the passion"

He was finally asked, ‘What have you changed in training’? "Just try and enjoy yourself & express yourself. I want to win Saturday and I felt the best way to do that is to make training as enjoyable as you can"

So Ryan Giggs needs no introduction in terms of what he’s achieved and we will not know what career he will have as a manager at ManUtd or elsewhere. We all know others have had great playing careers and under achieved in management. But what fascinates me is his immediate outlook on what is required. Bearing in mind his knowledge based on that fantastic unmatchable playing experience. I have not doubled up the comments above, that is the amount of times he said those words. Enjoyment, smiles etc. 

You hear so often fans say, well, you’re getting paid fortunes so just do your job etc. But clearly, money is not the only motivating factor. Football is. Why is it? Because we love it.

This interview made me think about everything I have said about how Academy football is and what it is becoming. Here is Ryan Giggs handed a 4 game job at one of the world’s biggest clubs and the first thing is to put smiles on the players faces and he’s not embarrassed to admit that he’s enjoying it himself. Yet, toward the end of my Academy time I felt that was suppressed. At some clubs enjoyment is not on the radar of things to be considered and players and coaches seem miserable. Full of pressure and stress. How can they play with that freedom Giggs describes when there being constantly reminded that every little kick of the ball is recorded, written down, typed up and chucked back at them on a weekly and 6 week report. 

So, you may think that you've come through the coaching ranks having never played the game at serious level and believe that your a 'learner/student' of the game. That's fine but try to recall or understand what it is like to play. When you implement EPPP and all its reports, try to cover the one thing the performance clock and auditor’s don’t need or ask. Are the kids happy? We all know most will not make it so at least let them enjoy the process and leave the system loving football as much or more than they did when they joined. Also, you may force talent out of the game that could have been great because they could never relax and smile.

I firmly believe you can coach to an excellent level being happy and still enable the kids to develop and learn. They don’t have to be miserable and stone faced to convince you the message has been absorbed. They can smile and learn. After all, it seems its key to getting the best out of £100k + per week footballers so why cant that be applied to your young players? 

I feel so strongly about this topic that I have made an immediate change to my own session plans. I want myself and my colleges that I coach with for my organisation to always be reminded of my key requirements. That’s before we get into the fine details of coaching. This is more a coaching philosophy not a playing philosophy. But by applying the former I think the latter can happen organically. So I've printed them on the session plan template as a constant reminder.

My constant reminder for myself and coaches

ENERGY:  Always encourage high tempo play from the players and lead by example as a coach. "Always get caught being yourself" Inject energy buy displaying it. Remember 'behaviour breads behaviour'. 

ENTHUSIASM: The coach, the teacher set the tone and feel of the group. Display plenty of enthusiasm and verbal encouragement. Inject confidence. Lead by example, smile, laugh be happy. Your asking players to work outside their comfort zone, so should you.

EMPATHY: Always be considerate to the players. Think about their circumstances, think about there feelings. Imagine being in their boots. Think about how you felt when you did your last coaching badge assessment. Was you apprehensive? A bit nervous? Was you completely relaxed and coaching with freedom? No, that’s because of pressure, pressure does horrible things to the system. Think about your words & be patient. My ultimate challenge, can you fix fine detail requirements of young players without them even knowing? There's a challenge. Just telling them what they did wrong isn't coaching.

ENJOYMENT: Most of all, if you asked all the players did they enjoy it what would they say? Of course that can be more than your demeanour, it could be simply boredom. Like over coaching, queues, lack of participation, critical words etc. So, do what ever you can to help them enjoy football. That doesn't mean you need to sacrifice discipline and organisation. There’s the challenge, behaviour, discipline and enjoyment can all be achieved together, work out how.

So, thanks Ryan Giggs. You have re-enforced that fundamental issue I raised regarding the so called changing face of youth development. Are the players happy? I will do everything I can to ensure the players in my care certainly are and I think I will have a wonderful environment where that freedom allows all the things you wanted in training this week.