Stoke V Chelsea Match Thread

luke. wrote:I really hate pre-match threads

Zzonked wrote:Is this on TV?

luke. wrote:It'll probably be;

Bosingwa Ivanovic Terry Cole
Mikel
Ramires Lampard
Anelka Drogba Malouda

DEALING WITH DEFENSIVE TEAMS
DS: How do you attack a team that plays with an ultra-low block?

AVB: Let’s see. Juventus play with an ultra-low block, they don’t put any pressure on you high up the field. Nowadays most teams don’t. It can limit you because they control the space behind them with perfect offside timing.
They limit your vertical passes as well because they are all grouped within 30 or 40 metres, completely closed in two lines of four plus the two forwards.

So you start constructing “short”, begin the attacking process with your centre-backs of full-backs carrying the ball forward to the midfield area but then you want to pass the ball to the midfielders and you don’t know how to do it, because there is an ultra-limited space, everything is completely closed.

DS: So what to do?

AVB: You have to provoke them with the ball, which is something most teams can’t do. I cannot understand it. It’s an essential factor in the game.

At this time of ultra-low defensive block teams, you will have to learn how to provoke them with the ball. It’s the ball they want, so you have to defy them using the ball as a carrot.

Louis Van Gaal’s idea is one of continuous circulation, one side to the other, until the moment that, when you change direction, an space opens up inside and you go through it.

So, he provokes the opponent with horizontal circulation of the ball, until the moment that the opponent will start to pressure out of despair. What I believe in is to challenge the rival by driving the ball into him.

That’s something Pep Guardiola believes is decisive. And that’s something that Henk ten Cate also took to Avram Grant’s Chelsea. He took it with him form Frank Rijkaard’s Barcelona. We did it differently at Chelsea under Mourinho.

Our attacking construction was different, with the ball going directly to the full-backs or midfielders. With Ten Cate, play was started with John Terry or Ricardo Carvalho, to invite the opponent’s pressure. Then you had one less opponent in the next step of construction.

luke. wrote:JohnBrewinESPN John Brewin
From a good source: Torres starts for Chelsea, Drogba does not. Malouda and Kalou start, no Anelka. Mikel, Lampard, Ramires in midfield.