Defensive structure over flair play, the story of group games

Spain’s ouster from the World Cup a couple of nights ago re-emphasised a growing trend in world hockey: teams cannot hope to progress based purely on skill and flair alone.
Teams have come into the World Cup with pre-planned defensive structures
Teams have come into the World Cup with pre-planned defensive structures

BHUBANESWAR: Spain’s ouster from the World Cup a couple of nights ago re-emphasised a growing trend in world hockey: teams cannot hope to progress based purely on skill and flair alone. The side was loaded with players adept at dribbling past rivals or picking a pass — in Enrique Gonzalez they had one of the principal dribblers in the modern game — but a lack of fight at the back and a Plan ‘B’ meant they were condemned to go down at the first time of asking. 

However, this wasn’t just a problem faced by the Spaniards at a tournament where most sides have come with a pre-planned defensive structure. Germany may have scored 10 goals to top Pool D (Group of Death) but their flair players have not been given carte blanche vis-a-vis attacking. “I wouldn’t say flair is dead in modern hockey,” their coach Stefan Kermas said. “As long as they perform within the defensive framework of the team, there will be no problems.” 

This was the mantra under previous Argentina coach Carlos Retegui. It’s a formula he used to take them to Olympic glory two years ago. That methodology has somewhat changed under new man German Orozco and the results are telling. And not in a good way.

He wanted the team to be a bit more creative in the attacking third — to reduce the burden on Gonzalo Peillat’s penalty corners — and it’s had a disastrous effect at the other end of the pitch, where the Olympic champions have conceded six field goals in three matches. Considering they only conceded a total of nine field goals in eight matches at the Olympics, Orozco has already spoken about trying to find a balance between defending and attacking. “We know that we need to strike that balance...we cannot go gung-ho.” 
That problem was felt too acutely by The Netherlands in their match against Germany. For all the first-half flair the Men in Orange showed, the latter just bade their time, defended deep and opted to play on the patience of the Dutch. 

When they ran out of patience, the Olympic bronze-medallists just picked them off on the counter. “We weren’t patient enough,” coach Max Caldas had pointed out after the defeat. “We were perhaps just rushing a little bit whenever we got the chance and we paid the price.” Rushing forward at every available opportunity was a problem the Indian coach Harendra Singh encountered in the hosts’ last group match against Canada.

So he asked his team to pull back a little and changed the game in the last quarter. Belgium, who have always allowed their flair players the leeway to strut their stuff as long as it did not compromise their overall defensive integrity, have come into this tournament with the same sort of mentality. “It’s exciting to score five goals or six goals every match to win,” Red Lions coach Shane McLeod said after their 5-1 win over South Africa. 

“But there needs to be some sort of defensive solidity to begin with because it’s practically impossible to score five goals back-to-back over six matches to win the World Cup. It’s good enough to win you a game or two. At the end of the tournament, the teams with the best attackers win you matches but the team with the best defence wins you the Cup and that’s what all teams come here to do.”  

Both Australia coach Colin Batch and Harendra backed this theory. Even if the two-time defending champs had put 11 past China on Friday, Batch got immense pleasure from keeping down their opponents’ circle entries to just four (the lowest in the tournament thus far) in the entire match. “We do not ignore that part of our game because of the way we want to build our attacks. A well-oiled defensive unit is key to our overall game plan.”

Harendra was happy to have topped Pool C but he had one minor quibble after their 5-1 win over Canada. “We didn’t get a clean sheet.”

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