Ramos' anti-tactics

[Locotoro]

When I used to play youth football in Spain I became familiar with a footballing term 'Contra la tactica'. Loosely translated means anti-tactics, basically means stoping the opposition from playing.

I wrote a post in a thread not long after Ramos took charge and before the changes that are now evident came to fruition. It generally highlighted the fact that Ramos is very capable of using anti-tactics. Ramos sets out his teams with two aims at the heart:
-1) To highlight the weaknesses of the opposition and ensuring they are exposed to full effect.
-2) To observe the strengths of the opposition and ensure they are incapable of playing to those strengths.

Have you ever wondered why the bigger teams seem to play crap against us?

ManUre -Scored that last minute goal against us to level 1-1. Tevez, who was previously on fire, was almost anonomous throughout.

Ar5ena1 - Got walloped 5-1 and didnt even whimper in their defeat. They didnt even get out of neutral.

Chelski - lost obviously on Sunday, but my god they were awful. On that showing who would consider them title challengers.

Now this doesnt take anything away from the way we played but I do think that the tactical nous of Ramos plays a large part in winning these duels. Even in Spain, Ramos made a habit of beating Real and Barca, (Real quite convincingly and Barca in the Euro SuperCup)

Just take two games in question:

ManUre - Strengths - Playing a wide and expansive offensive game with wingers who can stretch the middle play. Two mobile forwards who will both drop deep to collect the ball and play one-twos into feet.
- Lennon played very high up on the right hand side in this match (appeared to be glued to the touchline more so than normally) to keep Evra from getting forward and of course creates two very good chances himself

Ar5ena1 - Strengths - Playing quick throughballs to the front players and scoring from inside the box.
- So Tainio (more mobile than Hudd) plays and acts as a fantastic disciplined shield making interception after interception. Lots of closing down and fast counter attacking play against an attack minded Ar5ena1 defence.

Chelski - Strengths - The long ball into Drogba with plenty of forward movement from Essien and Lampard, also lots of pace from Anelka and SWP.

- The extremely mobile Zokora plays and counteracts the forward runs of Lampard and Essien.
- Jenas plays a more defensive role doing a similar job tyo Zokora covering midfield runners.
- Woodgate ensures Drogba is not the hub of Chelski play by sending every long ball back into the abyss from whence it came.
- A midfielder is brought on for a defender as with 3 forwards we play 3 defenders and push the extra man forward.
- Lennon is switched to the left (with less defensive duties as a result of the extra midfielder) where he is pitted against the faltering Belletti.

Next time we play look at the way we set up and analyse the strengths and weaknesses of the opposition. I am willing to bet money that when we play Liverpool not only will we beat them but they will be absolutely awful and will have an "off day" as the pundits like to call it.

I do believe we have the most tactically minded manager in the Prem!!

:hump::hump::hump:

 

[TheChosenOne]

Sounds a bit like "X files" * or something ?


* Notice I have been using a lot of inverted commas lately ?

 

[Tickers]

"Next you’re going to tell us you're Santa or something"

"No, Dougal, I'm the opposite of Santa."

"The anti-Santa?"

 

[Locotoro]

"Next you’re going to tell us you're Santa or something"

"No, Dougal, I'm the opposite of Santa."

"The anti-Santa?"

Anti-tactics is just the english translation to the term and I dont exactly know why I've used so many "of these" :roll:

The point is still valid though, have you not looked at our team sheet and thought...hmmm i wonder why?

Like against sunderland, we played Hudd at the back for the first time. Why? Was it because Sunderland were unlikely to press us high up the pitch and he is able to control the game from the backline.

Besides being the anti-Santa would be pretty decent, get to go around stealing everyone's Xmas pressies...then again wouldnt that make me the Grinch???

 

[TheChosenOne]

Hey, I ain't knocking it, just don't understand it.

Good article.

 

[alamo]

I kinda get where you are coming from but to suggest the top 4 general play badly against us is about as far from the truth as you can get. It's only since Ramos took over we have begun to notice an upturn in fortunes, the memorable 2-1 against Chelsea at the lane aside.

By anti-tactics I assume you mean pressing play. As in we now harry all over the pitch to disrupt the opponents game and then when we do have the ball play to our own strengths?

 

[TheChosenOne]

I kinda get where you are coming from but to suggest the top 4 general play badly against us is about as far from the truth as you can get. It's only since Ramos took over we have begun to notice an upturn in fortunes, the memorable 2-1 against Chelsea at the lane aside.

By anti-tactics I assume you mean pressing play. As in we now harry all over the pitch to disrupt the opponents game and then when we do have the ball play to our own strengths?

You could be on to summat here Alamo - "counter tactics "
may well be what Loco is saying. v much thanks

 

[TheChosenOne]

I kinda get where you are coming from but to suggest the top 4 general play badly against us is about as far from the truth as you can get. It's only since Ramos took over we have begun to notice an upturn in fortunes, the memorable 2-1 against Chelsea at the lane aside.

By anti-tactics I assume you mean pressing play. As in we now harry all over the pitch to disrupt the opponents game and then when we do have the ball play to our own strengths?

Be careful, this has a hidden meaning !

 

[Johnspur]

That article hurt my mind.

I'm sure it makes perfect sense though.

 

[Andy]

Good post,
Ramos is a great tactician and reads the game extremely well,
We should have got results from both of the Man utd games (if Berbatov hadn't have hit the post at 2-1 it could have ended up going either way)
Arsenal were clearly outplayed, Chelsea were poor,
I think our next hardest test is going to be getting the team to focus on the league and trying for a high position especially as europe is in the bag.

 

[guy]

Ive come to a conclusion about juande.

HE'S DA F*CKIN MON!!

 

[Locotoro]

i think counter tactics would probably be a better term to use. but i dont just mean the pressing and closing down. i also think that picking specific players to play a specific role like hudd, zokora and tainio or making a change in formation and personnel

i dont see how the saying the top teams are not playing well against ramos' spurs is far from the truth as its happened in the last 3 matches. plus united were hardly awe inspiring in the fa cup loss either when o'hara kept ronaldo quiet for most the game. definately a pattern emerging

ps last years 2-1 win was 1 in victory in 29 under jol i think. ramos record so far is 2 from 5 (from memory).

 

[EmperorKabir]

football is quite obviously about 'anti tactics' or as i would rather simplify it to, bluffing.

The weaker team will always play to stop the stronger team in the areas where they are particularly strong, but then the stronger team might forsee this and field a team which is strong in a completely different way, even if that means changing just one player.

The team that gets the luck in attacking or defending in the advantagous way will win the match, which is why there is luck in football, and why it's good to have a big squad with variety, and 2 or 3 players who are just so damned good that you can play to their strengths and nobody can even stop you.

 

[shinyospurs]

Totally agreed.. :clap:

 

[USA_SPURS]

i am tactically anti-tactical after reading this thread..whatever my statement means if it means anything but...

so WHEN my wife asks me to come home early bcz my daughter is driving her nuts ( tactic ) i can tell her i am gonna be late at work (anti-tactic ), but instead hang out with the guys playing cards?

will that work, u think ? thats a receipe for distaster man


anyway, i dont think Ramos with his strengths and "tactical" knowledge of the game depends on trying to figure out the weaknesses and strengths of the other teams and goes "anti-tactical" on them

maybe we can choose the plain and simple version of his "tactics" by admitting how good the guy is and how the players just wanna play for him.. how he is smart enough to the point where soon MAYBE..justttttttttt maybe other teams will try to "anti-tactic" the Spurs

simple man, the guy is good...knows how to win games.. no need to make it seem as complex ..

 

[Andy]

i think counter tactics would probably be a better term to use. but i dont just mean the pressing and closing down. i also think that picking specific players to play a specific role like hudd, zokora and tainio or making a change in formation and personnel

i dont see how the saying the top teams are not playing well against ramos' spurs is far from the truth as its happened in the last 3 matches. plus united were hardly awe inspiring in the fa cup loss either when o'hara kept ronaldo quiet for most the game. definately a pattern emerging

ps last years 2-1 win was 1 in victory in 29 under jol i think. ramos record so far is 2 from 5 (from memory).

Wasn't jol here for the 5-1 at chelsea too?

 

[alamo]

i dont see how the saying the top teams are not playing well against ramos' spurs is far from the truth as its happened in the last 3 matches. plus united were hardly awe inspiring in the fa cup loss either when o'hara kept ronaldo quiet for most the game.

Yep. Thats what I was trying to say and the point I thought you had missed. Just a language thing ;-)

 

[MattyP]

Too early in the morning for me, for a minute I thought you were on about anti tic tacs!

But you may be onto something, certainly do feel a lot more confident about games against the big four teams and have noticed how they seem not to be at their best against us. Maybe too early to say definitively, but so far so good.

 

[sloth]

Anti-tactics is a fine way to describe it Locotoro. Better than all the alternatives too.

And it's very clear what you're saying so I don't understand the confusion.

Someone writes that the big sides don't always play bad against us and that you should see some of the matches from before Ramos' time... well duh!!!

Someone else points out Jol's 2-1 versus Chelsea last season, but no one seems to engage with the principal.

Ramos is streets ahead of any previous coach we've had. His preperation, attention to detail, ability to get the best out of players, to develop their technical skills as well as athleticism and stamina mark him out as special and that's before you even look at his game-plan and in-game tactics.

On the specific point you make though and in response to the poster who mentions the 2-1 last year. The difference between our win against Chelsea and our near win at the Bridge in the cup, plus the numerous near wins against Arsenal, Man Utd and Liverpool over his three years is that Jol often found ways to pose awkward questions of the opposition (last year in the cup against Chelsea was a prime example of this) and in doing so neutralised their threats, but when the opposition adapted he couldn't react. He had no plan B. Nor did he, as Ramos does, adapt first or quickly. And his anti-tactics were very much about playing to our strengths which is attacking and very little about stopping opponents playing to theirs, which can mean attacking but also a range of other things.

You're also right to point to his time at Sevilla and the problems he caused the big sides. Interestingly although Sevilla had a reputation as an exciting dynamic team away from home their matches involved few goals and frugal defences.

Anyway gotta go as my daughter's going to start screaming in a bit. Good article though, with good observations.

 

[rickspur]

We beat the scum and chelsea because we had Ledders back + the addition of Woodgate