Crash and Burn

Be warned; 2094 words - a personal best.

Disappointed and despondent. That is how I feel after Saturday’s tournament in The Hague. I totally recognise that they are extreme emotions considering it was a tournament which in the grand scheme of things, was far from make or break.

However, I’ve been knocking around long enough to understand that you need to take every opportunity you have to win and we blew it big time on Saturday. That is where the disappointment came from.

The despondency is more linked to a combination of what caused the failure and what lies ahead. Our management team of Conan and Eoin will split in less than a month’s time. Conan is coming into a very busy period for his expanding business. Amid that uncertainty, it seems inevitable that my responsibilities as captain will have to expand beyond the limits which I want. Myself and Conan will sit down in the next couple of weeks to thrash out exactly what that means but hopefully it will not bring more training responsibility.

My reaction to our 3-09 to 1-06 win against Amsterdam A in the first game hinted that my subconscious has already immersed itself into some form of management mode. It’s rare that we put away teams and this was an Amsterdam team which we struggled to finish off in Frankfurt a month ago, when on paper at least, we were stronger than on Saturday.

I was furious coming off the pitch with some of the things we had done and was totally unconcerned with the margin of victory. We’d coughed up possession regularly, failed to track men, kicked ball away and given up an awful goal. On the flipside, the outlet Timmy and Paddy gave us in the forwards was reaping reward and Olof was holding his own in the competitive area of midfield but I felt defensively we were very disjointed and only wayward shooting spared us on occasion.

Eoin and Conan tried to reason with me by pointing out the margin of the victory and that we had suffered injuries, late arrivals etc but as funny/ridiculous as it sounds, I was nearly inconsolable!

Next up was Luxembourg. They pretty much picked two even teams and put one in each group. The side we faced looked to have the more dangerous midfield and forwards. We led by two points at the break but couldn’t shake them off. They missed a free to level with the last kick of the game which meant we won the group. It was an improved showing.

That meant we played their other team in the semi. This side looked to be stronger defensively. We were extremely slow to start and conceded a goal early on. I’d carried the ball up field and as I approached their goal I tried to layoff to Mike. My pass was too low and he had to reach for it in traffic. The ball broke free and Lux went up field to goal. It was sloppy on my behalf.

Timmy cut the four point half time deficit with a great goal but again we coughed up another shocker. Their young and diminutive corner forward managed to fist a high ball to the net. We couldn’t claw it back. I committed two school boy errors by dropping two shots just under the crossbar into the keeper’s hands and Mike Lucey missed two very scorable frees in the closing minutes. We could have goaled too when Olof and Mike had a two on one but Gill’s pass found the defender and not Mike. We lost by a point.

I’m sure many will feel my description of how I feel/felt to be totally over the top. I can’t help that though. There’s only one reason I’ve ever played sport and that is to win, no matter if it’s some sort of game at training, a challenge game or a championship game. My primary purpose for playing sport is not to have social interaction or to make friends. It’s the enjoyment you get from working hard and winning. And I certainly wouldn’t link the feeling to being a bad loser. Lux fully deserved their victory and I certainly wouldn’t contest that.

The most difficult thing about playing sport is that not everyone is really focused on winning. Some know they aren’t, others think they are but actually are not. In the case of successful teams, they just happen to have more people with that priority on winning and with the willingness to do what it takes. It’s not necessarily linked to talent either. I’ve gotten on teams ahead of guys with more talent over the years and that was purely down to wanting it more.

Anyway, to get away from the philosophical and back to the specific. Win or lose I had intended to have a quiet night in on Saturday and that’s how it went. On Sunday morning I headed for an outlet mall just over an hour away. I was still pissed off. When I got back I headed for the gym with Crusher. He hadn’t played but didn’t mention anything about it until I brought it up. One of the first questions I asked him was who he had been talking to about it. He’d clearly been warned to avoid the topic for his own good!!

It’s easy to rant but you must put some sense on it or you can’t communicate the key points. After Saturday I came up with the following;

<1> Fitness – You often hear people say that a team isn’t fit enough. That infers the training isn’t getting them fit. In our situation that is not the case. Conan’s programme got anyone who attended training enough plenty fit. I offer Darragh Cotter as an example of a guy who is going from strength to strength and I have no doubt that it is because he has attended nearly every session and is getting the benefit.

However, some of the rest of us have not. I haven’t enough training under my belt and I knew it in the semi when my tank was totally empty. Timmy (he’s missed training due to neck injury) looked completely bollicksed in the semi and the surging runs from earlier in the day were nowhere to be seen. Colm MacEoin has picked up injuries in each tournament. He hasn’t trained enough. There are more in the same boat. The bottom line is that individuals are not fit enough and each person needs to address that and fix the reason they are not in the right condition.

<2> Ball carrying – On an 11-a-side game on tight pitches, there are very few people who should carry the ball and those who do should be further up the pitch and be the ones with the pace to get away from the man. Everywhere else on the field and anyone not blessed with that pace should look to move the ball as fast as possible.

My biggest issue against Amsterdam was that we were being blocked down or having the ball flicked away when we went to hand pass. In addition to that we lost possession by carrying it into contact numerous times. Worse again, we often tried to carry the ball past the man right along the sideline. That’s a dream for your opponent because he can easily push you over the line or force you to let fly aimlessly.

<3> Work rate – It’s a two way thing. You must work going forward and you must work going backwards. Invariably, people find it easier to work when you have possession and are moving forward. As a back, it’s the thing that makes your blood boil most; watching guys streaming through. There were countless examples at the weekend where our opponents broke up field and their marker either stood static or gave up the run after a while.

In the semi, the exact same situation occurred in the space of a couple of minutes. My man won the ball. I ushered him towards the sideline. He dilly dallied as he tried to find a gap to get past me. He must have had possession for 5/6 seconds. That means that even if support players had broken free of our lads, he was holding the ball sufficiently long enough to allow them track back. On both occasions, when he went to turn and give the ball back, he had at least two unmarked options.

Work rate must be relentless and unconditional. It doesn’t matter if it is your man or not, your error that led to the situation or not. As a minimum, the opponents in the most dangerous position must be picked up.

<4> Support play (linked to previous point)
At times, we really enjoy admiring our passes instead of moving on again to give an option. Hudson is especially good at this. He clenches his fists, places them on his hips, puffs the chest out and stands with a look of admiration on his face. Even if there is traffic blocking his view, he won’t move off the spot. Instead, he kind of reaches with his neck to adjust his view.

Anyway, give and go. Aside from helping the receiver, it also makes you a nightmare to mark as you are always moving. When we deliver a pass we tend to go very static.

Beyond that, our movement off the ball has plenty of scope for improvement too. To give an example; three of us were stuck up in the left corner with the ball on Saturday. Eventually Paddy found a gap and burst along the end line but the other two players stood still instead of shadowing his run into the box. Paddy drew the men but had couldn’t expose the space they left because no-one had moved into it. We must stay switched on and moving all the time.

<5> Communication – This covers a load of areas. I’ve been banging on about this for ages. On Saturday it improved as the day went on. Shane Ryan was in goal and if there is anything that man does well, its talk. I didn’t hear him in the first game though. Some of that may just have been a confidence issue as he is new to goalkeeping. As the day went on, he grew into the role more and more.

Ross is becoming much more vocal but others need to be heard more. Paddy is one guy I’d like to hear a lot more from on the pitch. I reckon he has a lot to offer.

In general though it’s not something we do well. Twice in a row our players collided because they didn’t call for high balls. Three times in a row, the opposition took successful short kick-outs. It always comes back to rugby for me when you want an example of good communication. Those fellas never shut up.

<6> Adapting – They say if you do the same things you will get the same results. We’ve been slow to be able to adapt to different situations in games. In Frankfurt, there was very little on for the direct ball in the final against Amsterdam. I had been intercepted a couple of times and instead of reverting to a shorter game, I persisted a couple of more times. There was a couple more at it too and we didn’t show an ability to quickly adjust.

On Saturday the pitch was tight. Shane’s kick-outs were clearing the half forward line frequently. Our inside forwards continued to hug the end line and were too far from the landing zone to take advantage. It happened time and again and we didn’t read it.

I realise that all sounds very doom and gloom but I do recognise that we only lost one game by one point despite being short many regulars. Furthermore, we were the only team to win two tournaments in the regional section. However, I also know that the Championship will be a big step up. Last year we cruised through Benelux and maybe that covered over some cracks. If we are to be serious challengers we need to address all of the above.

Very little of what I mentioned is linked to skill. The majority of the things i.e. fitness, work rate, communication and decision making (when to carry ball) are linked to attitude and commitment. Our club and our training are geared towards nourishing these things.

Whether we learn is, as always, down to the individual. We have two weeks off and then a six week run-in to the first Pan-E round. Time will tell.