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Blackpool got off to a perfect start on Saturday with a 2-0 win away at Millwall, which saw Ian Holloway keep his unbeaten opening day record as ‘Pool manager intact. The searing heat made for a punishing afternoon in the sun, but a professional performance meant Blackpool showed their class to take all three points and top the table after the first game for the third consecutive season. Here are my thoughts on the match:
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The first league game of any season is always something of an unknown, yet for the majority of football fans up and down the country it is that uncertainty that holds so much of the excitement of an opening day. Writing a match preview therefore is somewhat difficult given a lack of recent matches to base opinions on, although the shifting of the League Cup 1st round to inaugurate the season does help a little. Nonetheless, let’s look ahead to this weekend’s curtain-raiser and see what The New Den has in store for Blackpool.
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Days away from the start of the season, teams up and down the country will be eager to kick off the campaign in the best possible fashion. Blackpool are no different, and given the relatively small turnover of players, should be well positioned to make a strong start. However, one wonders just how key early points on the board are. Does a flying start equate to success?
With that in mind, I’ve carried out some research from the last five seasons into how teams winning automatic promotion – Blackpool’s lofty target – have begun the Championship season. For the purposes of this exercise, I have read ‘start of the season’ to mean the opening 10 fixtures. Here are the findings:
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Throughout last season I analysed the relative difficulty of Blackpool’s fixtures based on a system devised by the brains over at Experimental 3-6-1 – the season visualiser. For the most part the visualiser held up pretty well and was a good way of tracking progress during the course of the campaign.
I’m pleased to announce that the visualiser will once more be a regular feature on the blog this season, with thanks due again to Ben Mayhew (@experimental361) for providing the raw data which allows me to manipulate the figures into various charts and graphs.
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With the dust long since settled on the disappointment of Wembley, the new campaign and a fresh assault on promotion to the Premier League is less than a week away. The feel to the playing side going into the opening day is notably different from recent seasons and optimism reigns – cup defeat to Morecambe aside. Many supporters are beginning to believe in the prospect of a first automatic promotion since 1985. That expectation may be premature, yet having come so close last time round, a few tweaks here and there and a smoothing of the rough edges could see that long-held ambition fulfilled.
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Although Blackpool narrowly missed out on winning promotion to the Premier League the signs for next season are promising. This is in large part to the two wide players who excelled last season and the prospect of them staying next season gives hope to Blackpool that they will make an even stronger challenge for promotion. Those two wide men are the focus of this article, looking at their qualities and where they still need to develop.
No Doubting Thomas
Ince (20) joined Blackpool from Liverpool around the same time as Gerardo Bruna and the difference in development between the two could not be further apart. Ince has grown with each game and is now one of Blackpool’s key attacking weapons, whilst Bruna mopes around Bloomfield Road like a man who really doesn’t love the game anymore.
First impressions of Ince were of a young player with pace and a trick, but perhaps running too much with his head down, narrowing his field of vision. Taking his place as one of the two wide forwards, normally as an inverted winger on the right, he appears to have developed with the game time he has had. His first touch is solid, but inconsistent, his passing also lacks consistency, both in range and execution.
However, he has good acceleration and sustains his pace well to beat men. His tricks are a little readable and could do with adding more subtlety and disguise to elevate his one v one play. On the evidence of his goals (particularly against Doncaster at home) he can hit powerful shots and allied to that his delivery from wide free kicks and corners can be useful. He could do with developing more variety to his delivery and perhaps developing his pace of delivery and craft to move the ball with more bias towards the end of its flight.
It appears that he is mentally strong and doesn’t appear to lose his composure the closer he gets to the opposition goal. He appears to need to increase his field of vision to appreciate his options earlier which will also help with his decision-making. Overall, his development is on an upward trajectory increasing more than any other Blackpool player and if he keep developing at this rate he will outgrow this Blackpool side should they fail to gain promotion next season. He is assisted by the fact Ian Holloway knows how to develop talent and he suits the system that Blackpool play. In addition to settling in to either wide forward position and has even dropped deeper and centrally at times and realistically he could also be deployed as a very effective attacking left back. However, there’s no reason why over time he couldn’t develop in to a central role, but all the signs are that he is a potentially dangerous attacking wide player.
One area of his game that can be detrimental to his development and the flow of his team is the upon receiving the ball. He has a habit of turning back away from goal in order to protect the ball from the opponent. On the face of it this isn’t necessarily a bad move, however, it appears totally instinctive. What makes it worse is that he does this even when not being marked, leading to attacks slowing down and removing his vision from the field of play that he is being asked to attack. This may well be a consequence of being deployed as an inverted winger and not being comfortable letting the ball run across his body on to his weaker right foot, however, it’s something that he needs to use with more discretion. In doing so, he will become a little more direct in his attacking play and cause even more stress for the opposition.
Where he goes from here will be interesting. He appears ambitious and will want to move on at the earliest opportunity, however, his long-term career may well be best served with at least another season by the seaside under Ian Holloway.
Express Yourself
Phillips (21) started the season being touted as ‘one to watch’ in the Championship and in terms of development appeared to be some way ahead of Ince. He ended the season as a player elected in to the Championship team of the season and being capped by Scotland. However, his development hasn’t been as evident as that of Ince, but that may be more to do with the fact that his skill set was in a more advanced state after an excellent schooling at Wycombe as well as a season in the Premier League behind him.
There’s no point in delaying the key observation about Phillips’ main weakness as it has been, and will be, very critical to where his career path leads. If he conquers it, then there really is no limit to where he can be in three years time, fail to do so and he may sparkle in fits and fade more often. Quite simply it appears that Phillips has issues with confidence or belief in himself which affects his game play from time to time. Whilst not being overly dominant at this stage of his career, it is likely to affect him more and more should he fail to develop the mental side to his game. This emanates less so in his tendency to ‘drop his head’, but more so in the way that he tries to force things in order to prove that he can do the almost impossible. He was surprisingly loaned out to Sheffield United earlier in the season after a poor start to the season, when he was being closely monitored by the opposition and not really getting involved in games. The loan spell served to get him in to a quality League One side where he could flourish in games where he was clearly above the level of the opponent he faced. He scored five goals and came back to Blackpool with complete belief in himself that he could do anything. In the ‘afterburn’ of that loan spell he scored a further twelve goals, before settling in to a greater level of consistency in the end of season run in.
If a team lets Phillips impose himself on a game, then he will, however, he is tested to the limits of his belief when those margins are squeezed. Let him turn and give him five or ten yards and he will hurt most defences in any English league. He can score and create from anywhere in the final third. When he starts, he lines up in the wide left forward position and seeks to cut inside to get his shot away. Very few players will beat him for pace, he is also strong and tricky. His step overs can be a little readable and he does have a tendency to sit back on his heels as he does this, which doesn’t give him a dynamic body position in which to drive forward in to a darting run taking away that vital split second needed in to advanced attacking areas where space is tight.
He can be stopped a little too easily when teams get tight to him, stop him from turning and he has little in his skill set to be able to effectively turn and beat a man. Should he be able to develop attacks when under such close attention then this will form a critical part of his next development stage. This needs to be aided by an improvement in his first touch. To the casual observer his touch may not be questioned, however, he has a noticeable flaw under closer scrutiny. In wanting to keep his head up he doesn’t always watch the ball on to his foot, which in itself isn’t a major issue, top players don’t need to watch the ball on to their foot, but they must use their all round sense and technique to keep the ball under control. Quite often the ball will bounce upwards upon Phillips’ first touch leading to him needed a further touch to full control the ball before executing his next move. This is critical when being closely marked, but also when he gets space it can interrupt his flow. Should he polish up this first touch then defences will need to be on full alert as he will be up to full speed earlier, or getting his powerful shot away earlier. Or as seen in the playoff final delivering a defence splitting through ball from the middle third.
Whilst he is generally deployed as the wide left forward, he can play wide right too, as well as right wing and right back. However, his future may well lie in the central striking role. He hardly occupies that central space at the moment, but when he has he has shown that his hold up play is developing. Again the skills his may seek to develop his wide play may also benefit his future as a central striker.
Good things come….
Blackpool may only need to recruit three players this summer, however, that number may flex if a team comes up with the cash to force a sale for either of these young players. At this stage it is unlikely to happen, although dynamics away from Blackpool are hard to control and agents don’t always act with the players best interests in mind. Starting the new season at Blackpool should be the way to go for these two excellent young players. Do so and it’s highly likely that they’ll be playing Premier League football with Blackpool or some other team.
As almost everyone will know by now, West Ham beat Blackpool to make it back to the Premier League whilst Blackpool will have another season in the Championship.
The match itself held few surprises. Tactically it was relatively predictable with the majority of the elements cited in the preview playing out, even up to the drifting in at the back post by Ricardo Vaz Te which provide crucial at the end. In terms of analysis of the final the excellent The Seventy Two blog together a comprehensive deconstruction of events and it’s well worth a read. The key notes from the game were clearly the pressing, loose balls, Blackpool’s combination play, and the probing plays West Ham were making with long to medium distances passes to either win aerial duels or expose the space in behind Neal Eardley.
New Balance
Football is a game where balance is critical. Teams must be balanced in various ways and the job of the opposition is largely about throwing your team out of balance in whatever way possible. When games such as this are ‘in balance’ for large periods the game is generally settled by the team who converts the chances that come their way or handle the other critical moments, especially in defence. It is here where Blackpool fell just short. Matthew Phillips in particular will benefit from this experience as he’ll learn to clear his mind under pressure to execute his play with greater precision and quality. The Blackpool defence will add this to their learning as they continue their development in to a side that can defend, and perhaps this, more than the offensive side of things is where the two sides were separated.
In his second post match Sky television interview, Sam Allardyce laid his arm across the ‘inappropriate trophy’ that had just been handed over, he looked proud, tired and content all at the same time. However, it wasn’t the trophy that caught the eye, but the whiteboard in the background. Upon it alongside the names of Barry Ferguson and Stephen Dobbie were the words ‘Clean’ and ‘Sheet’. That was and always is a key priority for a man like Allardyce and even though they never achieved it, it can breed defensive discipline. Add this to the fact that the official man of the match was James Tomkins and you get a sense of where these teams have differed over the season. Tomkins has the qualities of a top defender (regardless of Blackpool’s goal), in that allied to his basic skills of heading and tackling, he has that ability at this level to not being exposed to the sort of last-ditch defending that heaps pressure upon teams. Blackpool on the other hand, has defenders who to the basics well, but perhaps don’t have the all round positional awareness at such a consistent level in order to quell teams in burgeoning moments of flight.
Hold up
In addition to this Blackpool missed the injured Gary Taylor-Fletcher as they failed to effectively engage the West Ham centre backs regularly in order to pull them apart or out of position. Kevin Phillips filled in, but despite his 16 goals this season, he appears to enjoy the latter stages of games when they breakdown giving him plenty of space to feast upon. He is superb at finding space, and his shooting is a sight to behold especially when unexpected and released early. However, the central striking role in this Blackpool set up, requires more than a traditional striker. It requires, part midfielder, wide forward and target man too. All too often when West Ham forced Blackpool to go long from back to front, Phillips failed to win the ball. This left Blackpool’s midfield to work hard in order to mop up the loose balls that appeared as a result.
The winning goal perhaps perfectly summed up the critical differences between these two teams. Forced to go long from his goal kick Matt Gilks started the chain of events that would lead to him picking the ball out of the back of the net. Here’s the sequence of actions;
Essentially there were four absolutely critical moments that created the final scuffle that Carlton Cole turned in to a goal. Of those four moments, two were ultimately preventable on Blackpool’s behalf and two combined in to one seamless move by a West Ham player who used his speed of thought, technique, positioning and awareness of movement ahead of him.
Eardley could have lunged and cut out the cross, Baptiste may have kept his feet and cleared, arguably Barry Ferguson could have anticipated the break of the ball that Collison seized upon. However, none of this happened, these things also happen for a reason. Yes, they brought back memories of Blackpool’s more calamitous moments in defence over the last few seasons, but as well as being a reminder of the past, it hints at what the future may have held. Blackpool’s Premier League campaign was littered with such defensive issues, and regardless of the recent defensive improvements, it’s in times of pressure where humans tend to revert to their old habits especially if the new ones are not fully ingrained.
Getting there
To see Blackpool at Wembley again was a privilege and to experience the flip side of the outcome might be an important experience for the players and supporters. There’s no shame in losing a football match, most teams lose more than they win, in fact football is probably a game of losses and how they are handled and built upon. This may seem a negative way of viewing things, but nevertheless it’s a way of viewing things. Acceptance goes hand in hand with this and whilst it is a noble approach to try to win every game, it needs to be accepted that more often than not, that won’t happen. Sides such as Stoke survive in the Premier League because they accept the games they are likely to lose and target those that they deem that winning is achievable. This isn’t to say that you give up, far from it, but sometimes you have to pick your battles. Again it’s about balance, going ‘hell for leather’ in trying to win each game can be exhausting. Knowing when to attack and when to defend is a fine art that only the best can master. There are signs that this Blackpool team are gradually getting more balance to their play. The earlier parts of the season saw the team losing their shape all too often making them weak and easy to pick off. It was common to see 6 of 7 players committed to attack leaving them exposed in transitions. Blackpool now attack with 5 or even 4 leaving more space for those players to attack and great security when a turnover occurs.
About the process
This is perhaps where Blackpool proves such a fascinating case; this side has quietly developed over the course of the season. The second half was stronger than the first and start next season in the same fashion with a smattering of further progress and automatic promotion may not be far off. It’s this prospect that perhaps offers Blackpool a better platform to jump from and in to the Premier League with a keen eye on keeping their status. The last promotion was a momentous feat, but it clearly caught the club cold and exposed their lack of structures, behaviours and strategy amongst other things. There are signs that the club has learnt from this and plans were being mapped out this time around should promotion have been gained i.e. under soil heating.
This leads to two aspects. Does the club carry out the potential (current) plans anyway? Or park them for the foreseeable with a view to revisiting them under certain conditions? Due to the way that Blackpool FC is operated, the biggest resource that the club has at its disposal is time. It’s unlikely that financial trouble will cripple the club as it has done and will do to other clubs. Therefore it’s far from unreasonable for the club to plan astutely and communicate plans effectively. The latter is critical as fans appreciation of the here and now is more keenly appreciated as they experience ‘stand still’ whilst other clubs buzz around in pursuit of glory.
Tough Nut
Obviously the Championship will have a different dynamic next season the six new teams will add their own levels of complexity. Sheffield Wednesday and Charlton will hope to follow the lead set by Norwich and Southampton in recent seasons and earn back to back promotions. Whilst Bolton, Blackburn and Wolves will bring their dishevelled states, dust themselves down and perhaps one or two of them will settle in to something good. Add this to the other good sides in the division and the Championship will be competitive as ever. Blackpool will require a few tweaks to their playing staff in the summer, but nothing too drastic. Keeping talent may be the biggest issues, but as Alan Pardew (after sending his scouts) warned on Sky after the final, Matt Phillips and Tom Ince perhaps need another season at this level. Wise words indeed and ones, if heeded, could grant Blackpool the explosive force needed to dictate games on a regular basis. In terms of recruitment, failures from January (Jamie Murphy and Michael Jacobs) may well be revisited as well as a follow-up on Ian Holloway’s stated admiration for Jacob Butterfield. However, the latter may well be in vain as Premier League teams appear to be waiting to swoop. The final pieces of the jigsaw may well come in the form of trying to secure last season’s successful loan signings such as Stephen Dobbie.
Another door opens
Whatever happens this summer, Blackpool must operate with an eye on being ready for pre-season. The last two summers have been borderline shambolic in terms of recruitment planning, albeit last season being better than the previous. This would go someway to keeping the balance and energy flowing at the club and hopefully the lessons from the Oyston money ‘scandal’ will have been learned and never faced again. For Tangerine Dreaming, the future is unclear. A summer break is needed as writing on Championship matches to the level desired is difficult due to the lack of useful metrics and the time needed to draw up meaningful articles. Expect a few close season articles in the next few weeks, read, comment and share as you wish. Thank you ever so much to everyone who has done the very same over the course of this season and since the blog started.
John
Tangerine Dreaming
Blackpool and West Ham United will step out at Wembley on Saturday to play in the hyperbolic richest game in football. Here is your match preview:
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Measured Progress 