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Here I will publish the email addresses of people who will contribute on this blog (If they want to). Who knows, may be the FIFA will pick one of them to be Blatter heir!

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In principle we welcome link exchanging as long as your blog/site content has no offending material. I will deal with each case as a stand alone proposal. Whether you want me to link to your blog through webroll, or a widget.

One of the easiest ways to promote your blog is through contributing here based on where you believe you fit most.

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For being a new blog, I am working on perfecting it at the moment starting with the basics. On this page, after finishing the basics, I will start publishing the features and updates in progress (that's not related to content) So you follow and recommend what may enrich the process.

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I am working on perfecting the blog at the moment starting with the basics. On this page I will publish the new features and updates (thats not related to content).

For any recommendations, dont hesitate to share your thoughts. 

Stay alert!

Testing the read more on main page

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Preface

I already erased a long introduction starting from Dunga World cup 1994 to Zanetti to prove my case showing that the player who is less twinkling in the game, is not necessarily the less important, public opinion is created through a vast of catchy slogans and emotional judgments, which turn to be considered as facts for the fans, but not necessarily for the team coach.

To save space on the article I will only paste the following about Dunga in the World cup 1994 where he was not even considered as a football player by the majority of Brazil fans but ended up being the key factor for winning the world cup:

“He would be consistently targeted by Brazilian press due to his supposedly thuggish style of playing. This period in Brazil's football history was called "Era Dunga", as according to fans and journalists he symbolized the less than thrilling, slow and defensive style of the team. In spite of that, Brazil's new coach Carlos Alberto Parreira kept Dunga as one of the starting eleven throughout the 1994 World Cup Qualifiers and Finals.”

“Raí actually started the 1994 World Cup as Brazilian captain but after a series of poor performances he was dropped altogether for Mazinho. Dunga took the captaincy and went on to lift the trophy. Dunga had redeemed himself in the eyes of the press and fans alike, and ever since has been considered a symbol of heart and determination.” (source: Wikipedia)

How often does it happen? All the fans all over the world believe in something, and feel it’s too obvious, and then get shocked that the coach does something else! How stupid is he? We all saw it! Hm…Really?

I believe the reason why fans can’t see things the same way coaches do is a result of the different criteria and situation each of the two parties come from while making an evaluation, and knowing that we are all fans here, lets try to figure out what make us get mislead while evaluating a team, a match, or a player performance:

1) We evaluate players performance in a game comparing them to each other and applying the same criteria (passes/goals/tackles…); we put Messi in one palm and Abidal in the other and start to make our evaluation comparing the performance of the two guys the way we see it, Xavi and Gudjhonsen, Puyol and Alves, and so on…But how often do we try to figure out the tactical role of each player and evaluate him based exclusively on how successful he was implementing what the coach selected him to do in the game, believe me we get a different impression when we do so, try it! If it’s all about “hey you Messi, attack! You Yaya, Defend!” then we can all turn to become coaches, piece of cake! But we all know that the devil hides in details, so aside of the obvious, do we really try to go in depth?

2) We get more influenced by players’ names than players form: We have the right to do so, simply because we only watch the players during the games, when they play or even playED before a sequence of good games then that’s it for us! This is our man, and he has to be a starter, but who know how this guy performance, form, moral and fitness level was during a week separating two games? Who know the progress of the alternatives that can play in this player position? The answer is simple, it’s the coach.

3) Again, we are so statistical oriented, whether we notice or we don’t, we hold a pen and paper and start taking notes: good pass, bad pass, goal! Missed! He earns this grade then! And even though I consider statistical data as a factor in building performance evaluation and decision making, but its only one factor of many forming that evaluation, so we cant consider Statistical numbers as a stand alone evaluation, its not that simple, we cant judge players only as individuals, a player does an assist successfully when a mate run to the right space, but not only that, also the other team mates move correctly to open space, make opponents busy and so on. While rating players we either give grade to the assist maker only or to the one who turn the assist to goal also, but where do we give the credit for those who are not visible on the Cam, without their moves this assist would have turned to become a failed attempt.

4) We exclusively focus on our team and ignore the opponent, and the most recent example is the game against Sevilla, it will be a reference in this article, I read a lot of evaluations about Alves performance for example, it was all based on him and ignoring the players he was playing against, you can't really evaluate his performance without taking in consideration the whole situation including opponents, he played against his former team, and that alone need an extreme mental strength – now if someone will throw the “he is professional” slogan on my face, I will hit back reminding that “he is a human” who will argue that? – we must not under estimate this factor both mentally and even football wise, those guys in Sevilla trained with him for years and know all the tricks. he also faced Adriano, one of the most dynamic wingers in la liga, then after Adriano it was Capel, still he managed to perform decently in the first half and perfectly in the second – I will come back to that later. So for me, this was one of the best performances of Alves wearing the Catalan shirt, if not absolutely the best, unlike the general opinion.

TO THE POINT!
It was important to clarify the mentioned points before heading to the objective of this article, “the mystery of the third midfielder”.

When we analyze Barcelona midfield, we don’t need more than a second to understand Yaya/Busquets role as a Defensive midfielder and Xavi as a midfield maestro and ball distributor, then…we arrive to the third position in the midfield and we start scratching our head, who is playing there? And what exactly does he do?

I think its there where the unfair criticism of the players taking that seat start, in our subconscious Yaya role is to crush opponents, every time he do so we rub our palms with excitement and hail the guy.

The same goes for Xavi, the moment he gets the ball we know he will run the show, and it turns to become easy for us to evaluate how good he is doing so in a specific game.

But when it comes to the third midfielder, we stand in the dark cloud of confusion, how can we judge a guy based on his role if we don’t know exactly that role? So we start evaluating him compared to Xavi (the best when it come to ball distrebution and dectating tempo) and conclude that the third midfielder was out of the game, or we compare him to Yaya and of course the third midfieldewr was not as good as Yaya gaining the ball back, meaning, the third midfielder was a waste of space.

My question is, if we followed the same method and compared Xavi to Yaya regarding physical presence how will we rate him, the same as for Yaya ability to orchastrate the game compared to Xavi, will that be fair for any of them? Then how come it is fair for the third midfielder?

It was noticed since the beginning of the season that this is going to be the unlucky, unpopular guy, and after the Sevilla game it was too obvious to ignore, specially that the guy who took that seat was Keita, one of the best additions to Barcelona squad for this season, I know now you already feel upset of me for saying that, but I hope you give this a chance and that we all be open to seek the facts out of fakes, I already faced lot of criticism while handling sensitive Barcelona cases on this blog, starting with Iniesta on the wing, Abidal, Valdes, Henry, and some other cases, and I know this will be no different, but I prefer to be honest than popular.

Sevilla - Barcelona Game and a genius called Guardiola!
I still stand faithful to my early opinion, I will not evaluate Guardiola era before giving it enough time to mature, but if Sevilla game is a sample of what will follow then, I am more excited than ever been with this new project! What Guardiola and the tactical staff did in that game was something to be proud of, finally and after years of waiting it happened, we have on the bench the staff needed to turn a football game to a chess Battle!

I did no report after Sevilla game, and this article was one of the reasons, I will not do one now, I will only mention what I need in this article.

Two things won us that game more than anything else! Pre-season preparation and tactical brilliance, and it’s so strange that the two factors were ignored in all the evaluations I read after that game.

Pre-season preparations include smart signing that serve the project, and physical preparations that turned our ultra technical players to fitness monsters, if the first half scenario happened last season we would have definitely lost the game in the second half, a Titanic physical battle where bones crushed on bones while the two teams continuously blocked hits and hit back, as if the loser dies and the victorious will be crowned ruling the universe, this first half sucked lot of energy, and here the pre-season preparations, beside ROTATION, played a deciding role in the second half.

Now talking about our unfortunate guy – Keita- who played that doomed third midfielder role, his tactical role in the first half was to make sure Sevilla right winger loses the path of the right flank, so Puyol can focus covering Pique and Marquez in their battle against Kanoute and Fabiano, this is something Puyol couldnt do if De Mul bothered him continuously from the right flank. It’s a shame De mul may not play against Real Madrid now that Navas is ready, but keep following Sevilla and track this guy performance so you know later how lucky we are that Keita dominated this guy permanently in the first half, and forced Sevilla to forget about this flank and limiting Puyol contribution defensively as a left Back while acting as a third central back. Beside, and as a secondary role, Keita got involved shrinking the spaces so the ball holder get smashed on Yaya towers , slowing down Sevilla counter attacks both from the middle and on the right.

With Alves penetrating on the right, pique inability to cover behind him because he had to deal with his own mess (remember I told you before the game if Adriano succeeded to go forward don’t curse Pique after the game? You cursed him, but I will not comment on that now though its not only his fault being shaky), Yaya had to carry more than one melon in each hand, Keita moving forward when the team attack, Messi being forced to get involved in the physical battle he doesn’t like, Eto’o and Henry sprinting back and forth to help earning the ball then moving to the box, and Xavi getting hooked in the traffic jam tackling and distributing balls under pressure, it was a game of harmonic tide and current, where Sevilla were physically ready for this battle, sharing dominance, hitting back and causing threat.

And here is my favorite part, the tactical staff made their magical touch between the two halves, they created what I like to call "The Hammers and the Anvil" structure, and that’s how they squeezed Sevilla and crushed their hopes!

In the second half, the three central backs structure became permanent, then in front of defense (and here the piece of art show its face) Pep and co formed the Anvil creating a second line of Alves on the right, Yaya in the middle and Keita on the left-where Alves and Keita got the instructions to limit their offense doze for the defense favor, Xavi played in front of the Anvil while Messi, Eto’o and Henry switched the offence triangle, planting Messi as a striker, and behind him Eto’o and Henry who both have the physical structure needed to hit shoulders and chests against Sevilla players taking that mission of Messi shoulders, and so the second half started…

The line of communication between Kanoute / Fabiano and the rest of the Sevilla players was terminated. While the central backs trio contained the two strikers, the Sevilla midfielders were running for their lives, being crushed between the Anvil mentioned above and the hammers called Eto’o and Henry contributing with General Xavi.

With Keita-Yaya-Alves forming a solid wall, Sevilla counter attacks became history, spaces vanished and Sevilla found it impossible to see what lies behind that wall, they collapsed mentally and physically, and felt their weakness and lack of options in front of their opponents, that’s how the game was won.

Yes Keita was not the guy who scored, neither the guy who took the distribution role, but without his presence, things would have been totally deferent, which means in another words, he made a difference, though it was not seen or appreciated.

The Third Midfielder mystery of invisible impact:
The third midfielder is actually Pep Guardiola magical card, and he signed the right players to play that card as needed. Keita, Hleb, and Gudjhonsen are the players for various missions, if he needed a player for more physical dominance he picks Keita, if he wanted a distributing assistant he picks Hleb, while if he wanted a midfielder to penetrate to the box and score goals, thats Gudjhonsen. Things still need time to mature, and we already predicted that, Keep in mind that the three players are new signings, including Gudjhonsen who for the first time feels being valued and valuable, so I consider him a new signing.

We say it needs time for the third midfielder options to find their steps and roles in the team, but are they bad at the moment? Again, I think that’s not accurate, but another elusion we have, based on the previous reasons mentioned that make the fans get mislead by players performance, added to the fact that journalists themselves are more being fans than professionals, when it comes to favorite a player over another, which effect their judgments no matter how they try to cover it, and also they fail to see what’s beneath the surface, and when a Journalist in Sport.es for example, or on goal.com make an evaluation, it turns to become permanent and unquestionable, specially when it meets the emotional taste of the fans, and may be they do it – journalists - for that purpose, again appealing, catchy evaluations is a must in the media, and it tops any other priority you may think about.

I decided to tackle this issue –the third midfielder impact- from various levels, Mixing football concepts with statistical data to create a complete figure, keeping in mind that the more we feel our permanent judgment is drifting radically toward numbers it means we are getting more theoretical and less realistic, the same as the more our evaluation is numbers/data free and only conceptual the more we need to doubt our objectivity, balance is the key for perfection, and that’s what I seek here, football concepts supported by Statistical Data, and i wish if Stigsby was here to help me in this.

When Pep Guardiola signed as a Barcelona manager, he was fully aware of the lessons provided last season, he was so clear about what he wanted to improve and the defects that prevented this quality squad from hitting the highest level, and for the midfield this is a bunch of points taken in consideration:

1. Lack of physical presence.
2. Fruitless possession with no direct touches and threat on goal (midfielders).
3. Lack of scoring in the midfield and being over dependent on the strikers to score goals – he even mentioned that openly in an interview.
4. Being more a team based on the quality of individuals rather than the performance of the group based on tactical skeleton and interrelated tasks for the players on the field.

If you feel it may be true but you will wait to notice it while watching a game, well my friend that’s another story, so may be together in another article we discuss the techniques that help us noticing what the cam don’t show during the game, because it is exclusively tracking the ball and the ball holder, while the serious business is whats happening behind the curtains.

Ramzi Tanani

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Be my Guest

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If you want to share your thoughts regarding a specific football topic, you can always contact me. Publish your thoughts on the blog and share it with our football community.

If english is not your first language, you dont need to worry. Its not mine either and I am aware its far from being perfect. As long as you can ramble to the point, you dont need to worry.

I am already having some talks with some friends with Shakesperian English quality to help as language editors. I think that will make our life easier.

If you already have a Blog, We will put a link for your blog under your contributions. We will also put a link in the main Menu under the webroll category. And will also list it in your briefing that we publish under the "Crew" category in the main menu. If you want a subdomain on this blog, we can manage it as well. The subdomain goes as follows:

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At the moment, this is still a one man show. I am publishing what I think will be interested to share. But if we can turn it to a project where people from all around the world contribute to lead it to a higher level, this will be an absolute awesomeness! This blog is your blog.

This is where I feel the contributions will leave the most vital impact at the moment:

Content Contribution:

-Language editors: English is not my first language. Some of the contributors may have the same problem as well. If you are the new Shakespeare, then do not dare to disappear! We can pass you our writings before we publish it, so you edit it first by eglishizing it (you see, that’s how bad my English is).

- Translators: If you know a language beside English, then we may have talk. there are lot of football analysts who write in various languages. Translate it on weekly bases (it won't require lot of your time), and share it with the rest of the world. If you are good in English and want to track an English speaking writer, brief and customize his articles then I will be glad to publish it as well.

- Reporters: Beside the guests who will write opinion pieces every once and while, if you feel you can contribute on weekly bases through writing a round up preview/review for a specific competition (Liga, EPL, seria A, CL,etc...) Then you are more than welcomed. I don’t recommend to write a preview for a specific team though as their are enough blogs tackling specific teams (unless if its an important game like El Classico, Derby, Champions' league final etc...). It has to be a competition round up.

- Writers: If you like to contribute in an opinion piece per week, we can schedule your articles to be published in a specific day (Say every Tuesday?) so people can expect it on advance.

- Any other way you may suggest if it meets the blog mission.

Technical contribution:

- Creating a new template for the blog: I am not a web developer, nor a blogging specialist. The interface you see is the best that I could come up with after customizing an already designed template (Check the footer). If you are experienced in blog related magic and can contribute in creating the next big thing, knock my door. I will introduce you - the technical gurus- so you know each other, before I hand you my neck.

- Comment session: Till we work on the new template, If anyone can suggest a method to improve the comments session, don’t hesitate.

- Managing the blog twitter.

- Managing the facebook related features of the blog.

- Any other enhancements that you may suggest.

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Name - Victor Polansky
Age - 49
Town, country - Novgorod the Great, Russia
Married, two daughters, two grandchildren.
Translator with 20+-year experience.
Personal likings: Zenit, MU, the Netherlands (always), the Danes of the mid-1980s and a lot of shorter "love affairs"; say, last spring it was Werder.
Personal dislikings: divers, "hands of God", etc.

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