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thefootballlife · 1 year

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Zlatne godine - Croatia's Silver Generation runs out of road vs Argentina

2022 has been perhaps the most productive World Cup Croatia have had, in spite of at the same time feeling a bit like a curtain call for a generation and also a missed opportunity.

If 2018 was the story of an underdog, 2022 is the story of ensuring Croatia will never be considered underdogs again. People could, and did, throw accusations of Croatia of being a one-off in Russia, able to get through to the final by a lucky draw that placed them avoiding any real top class sides before meeting France at the end of the tournament.

And while the manner of their qualification to the Semi finals in 2022 drew plenty of derision, given it comprised mainly of draws, a similar fluke nature could not be attributed to it. Japan beat Spain and Germany in their group and were disposed of on penalties. Brazil had thrashed South Korea and eased out of a difficult group but were out-thought and put out on penalties. Did luck come into it? Perhaps, but the list of great sides who have been able to achieve things without occasionally having the rub of the green is a list that doesn’t have any names on it.

If Argentina go on to win the World Cup, they will undoubtedly have had some luck themselves, going ahead courtesy of a penalty that came from a phase of play that started with a goal kick that should have been a corner while the penalty itself is one that ended up hotly debated with many noting that the VAR official who had undone Croatia in the 2018 final was on duty vs Argentina also.

(For what it’s worth, I would say it was a penalty also, but it probably fits into the uncomfortable grey area where VAR wouldn’t call out a clear and obvious error when it was given but, had it not been given on the pitch, VAR would probably have done nothing also given goalkeepers tend to get a bit of added leeway and as Livakovic did make some late effort to attempt to avoid the inevitable contact. The referee didn’t get it wrong but this is an area where he surely needed some more support - particularly given the stakes at play.)

And while we’ll get on to the real in depth stuff in a second, it’s fair to note that this 2022 Croatia side should be judged not on their loss to Argentina, a loss driven by the brilliance of Messi - a wildcard who has changed the direction of football games for my own entire adult life - but on their vanquishing of Brazil when a plan was put in place to nullify an opponent with a more talented side but one whose approach to play was going to be extremely predictable. It was a plan executed perfectly that was topped off by a career best performance from Dominik Livakovic in goals and showed that when plan and performance synergise for Croatia, they are capable of beating any side on the planet.

Argentina is what happens when those factors don’t match up.

Argentina should be given a bucketload of credit for doing something no side had managed in Qatar - throwing Croatia off their plan. I gave a media interview ahead of the game where I described the game as a battle between an Argentina side who aim to dictate mentality to a game and a Croatia one who aim to dictate rhythm to it. For the first thirty minutes, Croatia did the latter. For the following sixty, Argentina did the former.

The reason behind that is a depressingly simple one - Argentina threw two attacks straight up the middle before Croatia were fully set and neither were dealt with. One could argue that had Croatia not gone and conceded a second quickly after the first, that the game would have come back under their control and would have been recoverable. But they did, so it wasn’t.

But much of why things went wrong and many of the criticisms laid at Croatia’s door are also things that are fixable. One could point to Josko Gvardiol having a bad game but when Messi decides to have perhaps his greatest World Cup game against you, there’s very little you can do aside from stay tight, harass him and hope he doesn’t produce some magic that makes you look a bit silly. Gvardiol did the first two of those well and was unfortunate enough to run into the greatest footballer of all time on a particularly magical night. As a twenty year old still learning the ropes, such a trial by fire will surely contribute greatly to his footballing education.

One could point to fatigue. It would be wrong partially to do so. After the Brazil game, the side was flying and there was no hint of it early against Argentina but the double whammy of a perceived injustice for the first goal and a tournament’s worth of bad luck and bad defending arriving all at once for the second will know the wind out of anyone’s sails. The side whose greatest strength was seen as its resilience were quite simply hit with a one-two so quickly that they were punch-drunk for a while and, by the time they’d recovered their composure, were punched out.

One could point to it being an inevitable result of tactics but that would do a disservice to Argentina and to Scaloni. Where Brazil last week and England in 2018 approached their vital games against Croatia with an insistence that plan A was all that was needed and that plan B was to do plan A but better, Argentina did the shocking thing of keeping their cards close to their chest and making adjustments to try to stop Croatia. By overloading the centre, they meant Juranovic couldn’t make the one-twos to Modric and Pasalic that allowed his running to be so impactful vs Brazil. They meant Perisic had to stay wide all first half and ensured that Croatia ran into the problem they’ve had all tournament in Sosa and Perisic basically just getting in each others way. They hassled everyone and made sure that Croatia’s outballs from the back were always awkward and, once they had put Croatia on the rack, they had the energy to get to every second ball. When Croatia adjusted to go all out in the second half, they locked up Petkovic tight so he couldn’t link up or turn to shoot. They, quite simply, socuted Croatia well and prepared a good plan. Having seen so many sides fail to do that in the past, it seems odd to attribute a victory on the grandest of stages to the simplest of things but that’s what they did.

If one wants to criticise Croatia’s plan against Argentina, then fair enough. They had corners in the first half which they consistently played short (with one leading to Argentina’s second). With Argentina having shown themselves vulnerable in the air against the Dutch, loading the box and putting the ball down Martinez’s throat with a bunch of near post runners would have made for an uncomfortable situation for Argentina early rather than slowing play down and worsening your own angles because, for some reason, you want to just play outswingers. The same came from a free kick early on that was on a nice angle for Sosa if on the edge of his range where they chose to cross (and didn’t disguise it well) rather than test Martinez. These situational choices may not have changed a single thing in the long run, but they’d have at least made Argentina have to think a little. The other criticisms would be of individual decisions but they are individual decisions that need to be framed in a longer lens than merely 90 minutes. Criticising Dejan Lovren for his line on the first goal isn’t worth doing given that Lovren is hardly likely to be starting games at Euro 2024, never mind in 2026.

The reality of the matter is that Zlatko Dalic has milked a generation he took over for everything it’s worth while also taking care to freshen it up gradually. He hasn’t had to deal with a flurry of international retirements and make rapid swathes of changes and, outside of the very first Nations League campaign, he hasn’t been forced to just throw players into situations they weren’t ready for. The generation that goes beyond this World Cup will have a very different make-up and Dalic’s challenge will be in firstly recognising who and what needs to change for Euro 2024 and then in identifying what the way to play at that point is because the Modric-Kovacic-Brozovic triangle in the centre will not be operational in 2026 and it isn’t that likely to be a default option in 2024 because a 39yo Modric isn’t that likely to be starting every game - as great as he is, even he surely has some physical limits to his durability.

Across the tournament, the potential impacts of future change have been obvious in Croatia’s failings. Ivan Perisic will surely choose international retirement in the near future and, given that he and Sosa didn’t really click as a partnership, that may be a positive change for the side in spite of Perisic’s undeniable qualities as an attacking player. For his part, Sosa perhaps had the most underwhelming tournament of any Croatian player - unable to really impose himself as an attacking player in spite of an extremely promising attacking record in the Bundesliga and finding himself as the least impressive of a defence where all three other members had periods of looking like some of the best positional players at the tournament. In his defence, Borna Barisic’s one game against Japan was hardly impressive and who knows what impact Sosa’s mid-tournament illness had on his fitness. Where Pasalic’s narrowness vs Brazil allowed Juranovic to excel, Perisic’s width stymied Sosa.

Were Ivan Perisic to hang them up for the Vatreni after the tournament, the immediate replacement would be Mislav Orsic who may not have the sheer quality of Perisic but does have the willingness to run all day long and links well with the strikers currently available. Orsic would, however, be 33 in 2026 and it feels a bit remiss to be too harsh on Perisic in a role where his only obvious replacement at this time is going to be the same age at the next World Cup as Perisic is now. Orsic is, for all he is a fabulous player, a sticking plaster on Croatia’s left-sided issue.

The larger issue is, of course, Croatia scoring goals. When John Herdman said F Croatia, he didn’t expect the immediate result to be Four Croatia, One Canada (although, he may end up proven right as things end up with Fourth - Croatia) but that’s about all the attacking Croatia did this tournament. The opener against Morocco was as poor a game in entertainment value as has been seen in the entire tournament. Belgium was a game where Croatia deserved their progress but could have gone wrong if Lukaku’s radar wasn’t broken.

And while every striker can be said to have contributed something to the mix - Kramaric in goals vs Canada, Livaja’s goal vs Canada, Petkovic’s goal vs Brazil and Budimir in his running creating the goal for Petkovic - none could be said to have contributed enough. The Kramaric issue is one well-known for Croatia insomuch as he just doesn’t quite fit what Zlatko Dalic wants from a striker and, at 31, he isn’t likely to be a pick for 2026. Nor is Ante Budimir, who is only a month younger. Bruno Petkovic is potentially around for 2026 at 28 but delights and frustrates in the sort of distinctly unequal measures that make you cherish the times when he is keyed in given how fleeting yet exceptional they are. Marko Livaja and the not-picked Antonio Colak are both 29 and both might be thoughts for 2026 albeit only Livaja has ever really shown enough to suggest he should be part of the squad - Colak has his talents but it’s hard not to think he’d be an even worse fit that Kramaric.

So the questions that face Zlatko Dalic as soon as the World Cup is over are ones not of Euro 2024 but of the 2026 World Cup - specifically who to bring through and how to do it. Croatia’s path to Euro 2024, barring the fact that they already possess a playoff spot through the Nations League is one they should progress through but one that’s also looks very much like it’s got some banana skins - how far will Wales have faded, can Turkey get through after falling at the last in trying to reach Qatar, can Armenia start to deliver on the potential some of their young stars undoubtedly have? It’s a group that shouldn’t be testing but it’s easy to imagine it could become it. It’s a group that doesn’t allow for a large changing of the guard.

Looking at the squad of 26 as a whole, you would say that at least 7 definitely won’t be playing in 26 (Barisic, Lovren, Vida, Modric, Perisic, Kramaric, Budimir) and those on the borderline aren’t small in number either (Livaja, Orsic, Brozovic, Petkovic) to total 11 probably replacements Croatia need to blood between here and 2026 with half of those surely needing to be in place by 2024 for continuity’s sake - that’s 1 LB, 2 CBs, 2 CMs, 4 STs and 2 LWs.

Which poses the question, of course, what a 2026 Croatia side looks like (and forces me into a bit of guesswork!). Assuming the 15 names in the squad that should still be about in 2026 remain fit and in form, you would look from a pool as follows…

From recent call-ups who missed out, Duje Caleta-Car (CB) Marin Pongracic (RB/CB), Luka Ivanusec (CM), Nikola Moro (CM), Josip Brekalo (RW) and Petar Musa (ST) would be in consideration simply for being already on the fringes of the squad (with some more fringe-y than others!) - on the fringes but not tried properly yet would also be Bosko Sutalo (CB), David Colina (LB), Mario Vuskovic (CB but pending suspension atm), Domagoj Bradaric (LB but a big if on him) and Dario Spikic (RW). Going into the U21s, you’d look at Hrvoje Smolcic (CB), Martin Baturina (CM), Marko Bulat (CM), Dion Beljo (ST), Stipe Biuk (LW), Marin Ljubicic (ST), Lukas Kacavenda (AM) and Roko Simic (ST) as all being well on the way to getting where Dalic needs them to be to be in consideration and, from under 19 level, you’d expect Lovro Zvonarek and Marko Brkljaca (both CM) to be pushing for spots as well. That’s 21 names without having to think too much or get overly ambitious about progress and that, I think, bodes well for the future of the side.

What Zlatko Dalic has to do, however, is coalesce some sort of playing style that transitions to the 2026 squad given what is there now is so reliant on Modric-Brozovic-Kovacic as a unit.

So while Qatar has been an achievement, it is one that is in perhaps more isolation than 2018. Croatia have carried a side that that arguably been in or on the cusp of transition for half a decade yet managed to reach the highest heights any nation can. They have reached the biggest game a nation can, they have taken the biggest scalps a nation can, they have over performed as far as a nation can. Yes - in a World Cup where you knock out Brazil and where the best side left in it are a side you beat away from home six months ago, there must be the feeling of an opportunity missed somewhat. But taken as part of a greater whole, you could hardly ask for anything more.

This squad, over a four and a bit years, have been the greatest ambassadors a country could possibly have. They have ensured Croatia will never be dark horses again and propelled a nation of 4m people (a fact you’re obliged to mention in any article about Croatia) into lasting relevance. The money earned will fund grassroots football and stadium improvements and bring many Spartan facilities into the 21st Century and create the next generation. It has renewed interest in the game domestically, spurred investment and inflated export prices for everyone creating a golden circle from these golden years. In an era where everything is framed with legacy in mind, this side has left one that will last well beyond the careers of even the youngest of these players.

This side is left to see if it can add Bronze to Silver rather than Gold. That it’s adding anything at all is an incredible achievement. A change will come in style and personnel - it simply must - but it comes from a position of strength, one where reaching the main events of the summers of 2024 and 2026 is not hope but expectation.

The golden years aren’t over. They’re just going to hit differently.

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thefootballlife · 1 year

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225 minutes of madness - Why Serbia flopped in Qatar

For the first half of Serbia’s opening group game against Brazil, you could have been forgiven for thinking the hype around the side was justified. With fitness issues and a Brazil side that was firmly picked to play on the front foot, Serbia put in an organised, disciplined performance that stifled the tournament favourites.

As the second half opened, Serbia tried passing around the back, fluffed their lines and gave up a chance. It wasn’t converted but it was enough for panic to set it. In the time between that moment and Serbia’s final touches in their final group game, calm was never restored and Serbia departed Qatar having been responsible for some of the most entertaining moments of Qatar so far, yet departed with one point but hundreds of talking points.

On return, Dragan Stojkovic was at pains to point to injuries and fitness issues as why this World Cup didn’t go how he had hoped. The reality will likely be obscured by the fact Serbia’s qualification for Euro 2024 is pretty assured already given their group draw and Nations League playoff backup but suffice it to say that Piksi’s pleas should fall upon some deaf ears for many a reason. To list the case for the prosecution:

Fitness

Piksi has been at pains to point out just how many doubts he had around fitness coming into the tournament. As per his account, eight players were unable to train fully on the first day of camp. But, more to the point, there were issues with key players which it appears that many people were just sort of in denial about. Aleksandar Mitrovic was said to be around the camp at times in a cast yet was on the pitch clearly not fully fit against Brazil and Cameroon. Dusan Vlahovic was unfit on arrival but played vs Bahrain then was a doubt for Brazil then came on, then was unfit for Cameroon before being fit for Switzerland and taken off early in the second half in spite of him saying he was fit. Kostic’s fitness was in need of management too.

From two perspectives, there were issues with how the squad was constructed. Firstly, there is the player welfare issue. One of Mitro’s most admirable traits is that he’ll run through walls for a side but what is admirable when fully fit is potentially damaging when trudging around forcing yourself to play through pain. If it was recognised within the management team, it certainly wasn’t appreciated fully and were he to miss time for Fulham following the resumption of the EPL, you can be certain his club will be furious and rightly so. Half fit players shouldn’t be playing 270 mins in eight days.

But the construction of the squad forced Piksi’s hand. Rightly, there would have been concern throughout the fans had the squad been announced and, for example, Mitro not been included in it. That said, would the squad really have been worse off had Piksi left (as an example) Uros Racic at home and brought an additional striker so that Mitro and Vlahovic could have been rotated more. It may not have mattered regardless given that it took until the last half hour of Serbia’s tournament for the actually fully fit Luka Jovic to make an appearance but in terms of having the options for the manager to be able to protect his recovering players, it’s clear that both numbers and willingness were needed far more than they were actually shown. It’s also worth noting that, during camp, one physio ended up having to go home due to an injury sustained because of a prank gone wrong the ended up with him in hospital and needing an operation.

While the strikeforce is obviously the most prominent of these issues, it’s fair to note that there were fitness concerns around Veljkovic after the Cameroon game, Pavlovic (who confessed he was playing injured after coming off in the Cameroon game) among others. A manager can’t control players getting injured, but they can manage workload to ensure the impact is lessened.

Communications

Pre-tournament, bullish. During tournament, farcical. Post-tournament, unrepentant.

That’s probably the easiest way to put it. Prior to the tournament, the focus was on ensuring everyone was united and enjoying themselves, with Piksi delivering some off the cuff comments that Brazilian players would state fired them up even more as they were seen as disrespectful. During the tournament, you can pick plenty of examples - tabloids in Serbia alleging scandals were the extreme of it but that was colourful fantasy added onto far more damaging accusations of fallings out in camp based around conflicting tales. One specific example would be that, between the Brazil and Cameroon games, different parts of the Serbia set up were briefing different media outlets different things about the fitness of players and, as a result, it was both difficult reading reports to get a handle on what exactly the situation was within the squad and difficult to believe the optimism that was coming out of Piksi’s mouth. After all, if you hear that Dusan Vlahovic is fit and then he’s just left on the bench in a must-win game vs Cameroon, then it’s only natural to wonder what went on. If you read certain sections of the media in Serbia, that’s absolutely the news you’d have heard.

Added to that came the squad making a rod for their own back with the “Nema Predaje” sign in the dressing room after the Brazil game. While it was a fan sign (which raises its own questions), very publicly showing support for a cause which, if we’re honest, has very little in the way of support outside of the borders of Serbia was unwise to say the least. It resulted in questions being asked (and FA reps having to shut the questions down) about thorny subjects in press conferences, the distraction of a FIFA investigation and it added an extra layer to the final game against Switzerland which contained multiple players of Kosovar or Albanian descent. While I’m sure many players wouldn’t care about that sort of question being asked, it turned the mood from some quarters against the squad and, potentially, turned the mood within the squad itself.

Mentality

One thing that many had thought Piksi had done away with was Serbia’s mental fragility. The side that simply didn’t turn up Vs Scotland in the Euro 2020 final had matured into a group of battle hardened warriors who had pushed past the might of Portugal to secure an automatic spot in Qatar.

Instead, what was delivered to the World Cup was a side that was prone to losing their heads. The mistake mentioned at the start of this piece was followed by a goal conceded 15 minutes and ten shots later and the floodgates opening as Brazil notched over 2 xG in the second half compared to 0.3 xG in the first. In one mistake, Serbia lost control of the game. Against Cameroon it was going from 3-1 up to 3-3 in under five minutes. Against Switzerland, it was goals conceded immediately before and immediately after the break to turn a 2-1 lead to a 3-2 defeat, the multiple bust-ups and seven bookings that could easily have been more. In each game, you can point to a short time period where Serbia lost their control over proceedings and in each game you can point to the aftermath of that loss of control and see that Serbia never regained it nor did they really threaten after those periods.

Call it disorganised, naive or whatever - the reality is that the horrid perception of Serbia as a mentally weak side was delivered three games which did nothing to disprove it. The side didn’t appear to know how to deal with setback and, worse still, got involved in the things they needed to avoid. Granit Xhaka had a lot of things said about him so I’ll add another - he had the entire Serbian travelling party on a string and riled them up to the point where they stopped thinking and stopped executing their plans. Whatever the provocation, it’s hard to justify having to see Piksi on the pitch having attempt to corral (and largely fail to) his bench from the pitch to stop them flinging insults and trying to start fights. It is, bluntly, embarrassing behaviour from a side of players who should know better and from a coaching staff (and administrative staff) who should be telling them not to get involved under any circumstances because they won’t come out on top.

They got involved. They went home.

That may be a simplistic look at things and, to be honest, it’s always easy to look at things like this from a thousand odd miles away from Kosovo Field. But when passion becomes a distraction, there has to be a decision made to put things to one side and ensuring that the time for making points is after a victory, not in the heat of battle.

Tactics

What worked during qualifying was, bluntly, found out during the tournament itself. Playing attacking football is fantastic but what Serbia didn’t often do was play joined up football. The obvious complaints are that the three centre-back system doesn’t have the right type of centre backs to work, that the Gudelj anchoring role was key prior to Qatar yet abandoned while there, that Sasa Lukic just straight up had a bad tournament, that Dusan Tadic was consistently locked down whenever he found space, that the defence was too narrow and there was consistently space in channels behind the wing backs for sides to break into, that they couldn’t deal with low crosses, that the line was too high, that the line was too disorganised, that subs came on and communication broke down, that players didn’t really offer runs to break lines aside from Kostic… there’s more I’m bound to have forgotten but some of the key points I’d make are these.

Piksi’s substitutions didn’t work. Any of them. Radonjic came on three times and did little. Stefan Mitrovic’s appearance Vs Cameroon was little short of disastrous. Marko Grujic and Filip Duricic are perhaps the only subs to get any credit whatsoever - Grujic was decent but replaced a much better Sergej vs Cameroon so it was still a net loss, Duricic came on twice and didn’t have the time to let anyone down either time. Given every single game slid away from Serbia, Piksi’s changes needed to be spot on to get Serbia back into games and, without fail, they didn’t succeed in improving Serbia’s result, control of the game state of the fluency of their play.

Against Cameroon, while you can chalk some down to having to react to Pavlovic going off injured (who started injured, lest we forget), the communication wasn’t there. Mitrovic played a line alongside Kostic and Veljkovic played one alongside Milenkovic which left acres of space in behind Serbia for Cameroon to attack into and, twice, to score from the space that this botched offside trap left.

Play was too static. Obviously, this isn’t improved by a half fit Mitro lumbering about like he’s at the back end of a marathon dragging a ball and chain behind him, but Serbia had few players willing to make runs until Kostic was fit Vs Cameroon and even then defences shifted around to shut off Tadic’s space to prevent supply getting to those runs. Chalk much of this down to fitness but they could always have just, y’know, done something else.

Serbia tried to play out from the back regularly. In each game, it gave up at least one chance to the opposition. The passing wasn’t crisp or quick enough to consistently avoid the press from other sides and the other sides quickly cottoned on that, to borrow a phrase, Serbia don’t like it up em. When you combine this with the previous issue, what you get is a side that doesn’t have the options up front to go long, doesn’t have the penetration out wide to do that and isn’t quick enough on the ground to just play keep ball. You watch a Croatia who move it around quickly and progressively to get their foothold in the opposition half before either probing or crossing and then you watch a Serbia who are trying that but getting caught doing it twenty yards further back.

All of this is fixable but all of it combined at once to mean that, to close this, I can only pose one question - should Piksi remain as national team manager?

There are issues that will be fixed with players coming through. The FSS going out and recruiting Samardzic and Bajcetic will help. Serbia’s age groups are still productive and have plenty to put faith in assuming they carry their progress into senior football.

There are issues, like fitness, that just couldn’t possibly reoccur. No side will go into Euro 24 or North America 26 with two thirds of their attacking options carrying injuries.

But the rest of it?

Piksi has enough credit in the bank - JUST - to have earned a chance to go for Euro 2024. Serbia’s qualification campaign for that begins Lithuania (H), Montenegro (A), Bulgaria (A) and if Serbia are sat with fewer than six points from those games, we will unquestionably be at the point where that credit will have run out. And, to get those results, Piksi will have to change his approach because Montenegro are resolute and Bulgaria are improved under the ghost of botched World Cups past in Mladen Krstajic. If lessons aren’t learned, then four years time will see yet another entertaining and heart-stopping failure. The FSS only have to look to Belgium to see the damage that keeping faith in the wrong man can do, particularly to a gifted generation.

Change must be seen from Piksi or Serbia must move on from him.

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thefootballlife · 2 years

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Carlisle United Season preview 22/23

After a 2021 that could be best described as utterly disastrous, 2022 began threatening to see Carlisle dumped out of the EFL until the second coming of Paul Simpson in February. After he joined the club, in the 15 games till the end of the season, Carlisle won eight, drawing one and losing six, with four of those losses coming in games after safety had more or less been secured. It was a startling revival albeit one that poses the question a little of how much optimism can be dismissed merely as a new manager bounce and the question of how much pessimism can be dismissed merely as the side mentally checking out when the stakes got low.

Had the Paul Simpson-era form been played out over the whole season, then Carlisle would have been firmly in the race for the playoffs rather than 20th. Plenty of reason for encouragement there and Simpson’s impact was obvious in that Carlisle were suddenly able to defend and provide Omari Patrick with the sort of support that meant his goals were winning games rather than being consolations.

From the depths of the Harry McKirdy show at Brunton Park in February, Carlisle saved themselves but, ahead of a new season, it’s clear there’s some more saving to do because the Paul Simpson effect was tangible - using the stats on the great Experimental 3-6-1 site, when he took over, Carlisle’s xPoints were 2 points higher than their actual points. After the final day, Carlisle’s xPoints were 11 below the actual tally. While the old saying of lies, damned lies and statistics holds true, they would state that Paul Simpson being at the club was responsible for 13 more points than they otherwise would have got. Using their stats also, Carlisle were about the most wasteful attacking side in the league, which is a hangover from the Beech-era tactics where shooting often and from distance was a regular thing but it’s an important thing to note ahead of this season that Carlisle need to be far more efficient given only Scunthorpe were worse and the gap between Carlisle and the next least efficient side (Stevenage) was far greater than that between Carlisle and Sucnthorpe.

We also must take into account Carlisle’s budget. While it would be pretty flippant to suggest that Carlisle budget simply for survival and nothing else, it wouldn’t be that incorrect to say that Carlisle have one of the smallest budgets in League Two - in 2021, it was in the bottom six of League Two and this season has seen what’s spent drop (which we’ll come onto in a minute). As covered before when I’ve written about Carlisle, the club are well-run but under serious financial constraints and for multiple seasons has operated on the assumption that a well run club with no money will operate more effectively than a badly run club with plenty of it. Based on that, there has always been the assumption that there will be at least two clubs having a worse time of it in any given season.

That’s a fair assumption that was borne out last season at Oldham (ownership issues) and Scunthorpe (long term issues and being absolutely terrible) left the league. This season, you’d find few people who are expecting Colchester to be much higher than bottom or Harrogate much higher than second bottom, Crewe have come down looking in horrible shape after a nightmare season last time, Crawley could finish in any position given no-one quite knows if they’ll be fun or fungible, Hartlepool fall into a similar category and Barrow have been circling a little while. All Carlisle need is two of those sides to have a bad season and they’ll be fine.

So, here comes the unbridled pessimism.

Last season had a saving grace in that United had good goalkeepers, particularly in the main regular Mark Howard. He’s gone. His backup Magnus Norman - also entirely decent - also gone. Rod McDonald, who was fine in defence, has gone. Joe Riley, a good midfielder, gone. Lewis Alessandra, who had a hard time with injury but always worked hard, gone. The squad needed a clearout but that’s a lot cleared out in the space of one summer. Jamie Devitt also left but looks like he may well return.

To be more positive, Tomas Holy should be a fine keeper for this level, Owen Moxon could be a great little get from Annan, Ryan Edmondson was fine on loan at Port Vale last sason and the loans of Sonny Hilton and Fin Back both look like really smart little transfers. Those numbers likely (more than) match what went out in quality but they don’t in volume. Tomas Holy currently stands to be backed up by youth products only. There are six senior defenders at the club, with it looking particularly short in the centre. The midfield does, at least, look very settled and Mellish, Guy, Dickenson and Hilton is a good League Two midfield at any club and that’s before you add the potential for Moxon to kick on and also from the return of Taylor Charters, who is well thought of within the club. Up front, it’s hard to argue with the spring form of both Omari Patrick and Kristian Dennis but it needs Ryan Edmondson to take to the side fairly quickly.

So while Carlisle definitely do have a very solid first team, I worry that, without more in the way of numbers in defensive areas, injuries and suspensions could be enough to severely curtail their ambitions this term. Obviously, the folly of talking about clubs pre-season is that there is a month of a transfer window left with which to resolve these issues and, to be fair, after the final friendly, Paul Simpson came out and said the club needs two or three more bodies but, so far, talks haven’t come out with further signings (which is the curse of an outpost club). Realistically, for Carlisle to be looking solely upwards rather than over their shoulders, that needs to take the form of a senior back-up goalkeeper, a left back, two centre-backs and a right sided midfielder. Whoever comes in in the next five weeks, you can probably say already that that volume of numbers won’t be coming in which means that things need to go right.

This isn’t to say that Carlisle can’t look upwards towards the playoffs, however. Simpson’s form when it really mattered last season was of a standard that would put Carlisle into that mix. But there’s an awful lot of clubs in the league who are looking to get into the playoffs and to compare to a side that would have ambitions of just that, for example Walsall, the squad just looks weaker than that sort of side in numbers definitely and perhaps in quality also. Paul Simpson will wring everything he can out of the side, but Carlisle do look a little behind the sides they would like to be competing with (particularly if an injury bug bites), even if they are a little ahead of those behind them.

Is this a bottom six side? Probably not, but it probably would be a bottom seven or eight side. If this side was managed by Chris Beech or Keith Millen, it’d be hard to think many fans would expect anything other than a season of struggle and the Simpson factor is a big factor to play as to how people expect Carlisle to do. I will round this off by simply saying that, from an expectation perspective 18th would be enough for Carlisle and that’s probably what will happen - they are in a hinterland between the sides you would clearly say will be in trouble and those who will definitely be looking for the playoffs and they’re likely in a hinterland of themselves alone who would be happy with just a quiet normal season.

The club’s issues are well documented and aren’t to do all that much with the playing department. As and when those issues eventually resolve themselves either with some sort of new deal around debt or, preferably, with a full takeover, then Carlisle can begin to look upwards again. Until then, a nothing season will be something.

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thefootballlife · 2 years

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Serbian Superliga Preview 22/23

It seems like only yesterday that the 2021/22 season ended with the final Nations League games but the crowbarring of Qatar into the world footballing schedule has pushed the start of the Serbian Superliga to begin on 9 July with many clubs beginning their pre-season preparations at the very start of June. As a result of Qatar, the league will shut down on 13 November, reawakening on 4 February as Crvena Zvezda (or Red Star Belgrade, if you prefer) look to secure a sixth title in a row and look to match Partizan’s six in a row record from betwee 07/08 and 12/13. Could this even be a season where we get a three horse race rather than a two as the potential for Cukaricki to break further away from the pack seems closer than ever?

While it perhaps wouldn’t be entirely fair to expect the latter, they’re a very good place to start given that they’ve made moves this summer with four excellent pick-ups to complement the side. The first of those is former Limassol manager Dusan Kerkez who won a cup on that island and, crucially, hung around for a while, a distinct change to many of his predecessors. He’ll start hoping to arrest a slide at the end of last season after manager (and all around legend) Sasa Ilic left during the final rounds of games.

But, for a side where their attacking roster looked a bit weaker than the rest, the business they’ve done so far has been mightily impressive. Luka Adzic, who looked very good in his Zvezda days, returns to Serbia after an injury impacted time in Belgium and the Netherlands. Dorde Ivanovic returns to Serbia after winning a title at Maribor. Yet the most impressive get might be that of the highly rated Stefan Tomovic from relegated Proleter (who have ceased to exist, merging into RFK Novi Sad) - going into the advanced stats, he was one of the very best attacking midfielders in the league with a great range of passing and intent that showed out as he scored 8 in 26 from midfield last season. In with better players and in with a more attacking set-up (Proleter are a notoriously negative side), a continuation of that form could produce a very eye-catching return for what is the nation’s smartest club.

While there will be players going (not least giant centre back Stefan Sapic who is more than due a big move), keep an eye out for Viktor Rogan, a right back that has recently signed a long term new deal - Cukaricki have a good track record producing in that position and have another good prospect in him. On pure first team quality alone, they now have a squad that can go toe-to-toe with anyone and matching or exceeding their record top flight points total of 74 this time around would not be a shock. In terms of improvements still to come, they do look a striker short but that is a pretty minor thing given what else they have in attack and it’s fair to note that many of the army of wingers at the side can play centrally also without losing too much in the way of impact.

Staying in Belgrade, Partizan have a new manager in Ilija Stolica. Stolica is well regarded and the tactical shift into forcing overloads upon the opposition will be something to look out for. However, it’s also quite hard not to get the feeling that the deman on Stolica is also to do more with a bit less. A fair few players have gone, most known of those being Lazar Markovic, but Nemanja Miletic and Milos Jojic are players they’ll miss too. Incomings have focused on the defensive area with Zlatan Sehovic (who returns after two years in Israel) and Aleks Filipovic (coming from BATE Borisov and likely looking to make a run at the national team) coming in joined also by Patrick Andrade, a fellow Cape Verdean of Ricardo, from Qarabag. They pale in comparison to bringing back Svetozar Markovic to the club - having departed for Olympiakos in 2019. Much of the focus on Partizan will be more about how they adapt to Stolica rather than the sheer power of the side. They came extremely close last season but, ultimately, lost it at the last through silly points being dropped more than failings of talent. If this side is mentally robust enough, then surely a similar run of dropping only 13 points all season will see them win the title.

Their eternal rivals of Crvena Zvezda come into the season looking interesting. Their pre-season hasn’t gone all that well, with some iffy results against smaller sides. But you would be a fool to bet against them - the outgoings are limited really only to Milan Gajic as any sort of loss (Srdan Babic was already at Almeria on loan - he’s the only fee they’ve made this summer). Coming in is the impressive Kings Kangwa from Arsenal Tula and Osman Bukari from Gent, two players who look like good deals and the sort of ones you buy for a shot at Europe, not at the Superliga. Add to that the natural progression they’ll get from young stars like Nemanja Motika, Petar Stanic, Nikola Stankovic and, if he stays around (albeit there’s a big bid in from Zenit currently being decided on), Strahinja Erakovic and you’ll see why it’s hard to bet against them. If you wanted to oppose them, you’d argue that surely Aleksandar Katai isn’t going to repeat his form from last season, arguably the best and certainly the most clutch individual season a player has ever had in the Superliga, and that Partizan lost the title last time out as much as Zvezda won it. On a personal note, I’m still undecided as to whether Stankovic is actually a good manager or not - he may have the titles, but Zvezda were often a chore to watch last season and much of their Autumn form was stodgy at best and still they only dropped 11 points all season. They begin the season as favourites, but ones where the only doubts are more around maintaining their impossible standards of the past two seasons rather than doubts of whether they can challenge.

The final Belgrade side are found up on the roof and, after a great season that got them close to Europe last time around, Vozdovac will be looking to build on that. Justas Lasickas is arguably the only major loss and much of what’s come in has been attacking related - Borislav Burmaz’s second tier record is more than good enough to suggest he will deal with the step up, particularly at a stronger club than his loan at Radnicki Kragujevac. Niksa Vujanovic comes with a good record from Rudar Pljevlja, particularly given he was the standout in a struggling side - albeit it’s worth noting you could say similar about the likes of Milos Zecevic and Vuk Strikovic, who have both struggled with a step up from that league. Arihiro Sentoku comes in also from FK Podgorica and, more than anything, offers a real attacking utility man given he can play on both sides, up front and in midfield. There’s also the imminent potential of Dragan Stoisavljevic, who will be a very good player if he gets up to speed this term - he’s due a breakout season. This season, perhaps more than last, they have a chance to breakthrough into the European places.

TSC will be looking to make progress again but have been relatively quiet this summer. You suspect their chances are directly related to how long they keep Mihajlo Banjac for and if he can repeat his form of last season. Much of the work has been around making a more robust side around him and it’s fair to note that the longer Martin Mircevski was at the club (joined in January), the more he looked like he was ready for another step up the footballing ladder. If they keep everyone together, they’ve got a chance of getting into Europe but it will be on the back of the form of Banjac and Mircevski.

Spartak had a surprisingly poor season last time out and look quite a bit weaker coming into this one. Lazar Tufegdzic, who they turned big money down for in 2021 hoping for another great season and a bidding war, has gone of under £500k after not having a great season and the club not having one with him (this was primarily down to behind the scenes nonsense). With Nemanja Nikolic gone to Vojvodina also, they’re a side you look at with concern, particularly as without both he and Tufegdzic, they look mightily weak up front.

Moving south slightly to Novi Sad and while there’s two clubs from the city in the league once more, Vojvodina will be joined not by Proleter but by the Coyotes of Mladost GAT who have secured four successive promotions to appear for their first go at the Superliga.

Vojvodina still have a bunch of players who you would have expected to have moved on by now. New on that list is Jovan Milosevic, a striker that took the Euro U17s by storm and is heavily linked to move to Benfica as soon as he hits 18. But similar moves will happen for more established types such as Mirko Topic and Dejan Zukic also. Milan Rastavac comes in as manager with a very good CV for what you normally see in dugouts in this league. The incoming players of Nemanja Nikolic (proven at this level over and over), Yves Baraye, Mamadou Traore and Lazar Carevic should all be of a level that they will make the team better. They’ve not really come all that close to making a side in recent years that actually is good enough to provide adequate support to some of the great talents the club has been producing - this season, they look closer to that than before.

Mladost are hard to judge given the sheer breakneck speed of their rise will obviously raise questions about exactly what quality is at the club, but manager Branko Zigic (Nikola’s brother) knows how to set a team up to not lose and has brought in a few seasoned defenders to shore the side up. Expect them to be absolutely eye bleeding but safe.

The other Mladost, the Uranium Boys of Lucani have recently put together a very productive youth system and their pathway’s first genuine star is Dorde Gordic who broke into the first team last season and has already been linked to most of Europe’s elite. He is both an extremely good young midfielder and an extremely recognisable one, given he comes with a hair style that can only be described as “David Luiz but Frizzy”. The club, as a whole, have bet big on their kids and, with a lot of players going out this summer, their gamble is that some are ready to make the step up alongside Gordic and lead the club on already - look out for Nikola Jojic and Uros Sremcevic as Mladost race to chase down Cukaricki as the best pound for pound youth system in the country. While that can often be a recipe for disaster, at least in the early stages of it being in practice before consistent talent comes through, there’s certainly poorer sides than them in the league

Radnicki Nis rounded off the European places last season but the top three were absolutely miles ahead of them. While not worse than last season, they aren’t better either and any side that thinks Sava Petrov is the answer to a question up front is one to have doubts about. They are unlikely to struggle, but it’s fair to say that the sides around them at the end of last season look like they’ve done more to progress than the Real sa Nisave have.

Radnicki Kragujevac were saved at the end of last season by the management of Nenad Lalatovic, who promptly went off to join Borac Banja Luka, because god knows the only club he’d fit at outside of Serbia itself is the main club of Bosnia’s Republika Srpska. He was able to inspire fight from a team that looked gone and managed to start a fight with a few fans as well. Lalatovic will probably win a title there given Borac have been raiding the Superliga for players but the side he brought from doom to being saved through the playoffs will be happy just to stay up. Three have gone to the Republika Srpska with their manager. That said, the incomings aren’t bad - Milutin Vidosavljevic has plenty of experience coming on loan from Cukaricki, Luka Zoric showed enough at a decent IMT side last term in the second tier to suggest he’s ready to step up, Dusan Cvetinovic comes back to Serbia after years in the J League and will bring experience and technique to the defence and Dusan Stoiljkovic is coming for a redemption season after an iffy one last time out. If it clicks, they can push for the top eight but it’s very rare that any side is better for Lalatovic leaving them (and he leaves sides a lot!) - recovering from the loss of arguably the league’s best and most colourful manager may be the biggest hurdle.

Napredak had a very decent season last time out. This time, there’s a little less rosiness - Milan Spremo is a big loss and the experience of Sasa Marjanovic going to Radnicki NIs is also something to recover from. Then you look at the replacements - Klemen Bolha comes to replace Marjanovic at the base of the midfield having been part of a dog of a relegated Aluminij side in Slovenia last season. Nikola Vukajlovic replacing Spremo has limited top tier experience and that was as part of a Novi Pazar side that was terrible, in the lowest quality Superliga season ever (20/21, when it had 4 extra sides, all of them bad). Take out two players that lifted the side and replace them with a bunch of players that have been iffy for sides in relegation mixes and it’s fair to say that a repeat of their top half finish isn’t on the cards.

Kolubara have made one of the most interesting signings of the summer - Croat Ante Vukusic from Tuzla City. He has had a disrupted past 18 months but everyone who watched him at Olimpija knows the bare facts - if Vukusic gets the supply and stays fit, he can score plenty of goals. Hence bringing in Vanja Ilic, one of the better wingers from the second tier, is a handy get. They need a couple of things to fall right for them and they need a little more depth in midfield, but the gambles they’ve made one be ones you expect to pay off.

Radnik’s season last time out wasn’t great but they coined it in with the sale of Milan Makaric to Aalborg last autumn and spent it on, well, a big old painting of Piksi Stojkovic and you can only say “fair enough”. They’ve done little business with the only incomings being Andrija Milic, a cast off of Spartak after loans in the second tier, and Vukasin Bogdanovic, a cast off of Vojvodina after loans in the second tier. That said, Uros Milovanovic did well last season fitting Makaric’s boots and a bit more growth this time into a 15-18 goal a season striker will do them wonders. They don’t have a defence to speak of, though, so they could be a fun watch.

Javor are, at this point, bouncing between the top and second tier like a Serbian Norwich so if you expect relegation, you might not be far off. That said, there’s some interesting players there. Norman Campbell was excellent in the second tier two seasons ago, then moved to Cukaricki, got racially abused on the first day and disappeared for the rest of the season - with a proper pre-season and a proper go at the Superliga, we should see his qualities. Luka Lukovic is a known entity at this level, as is Petar Gigic. MIlan Obradovic is also an interesting one returning to the league after a disappointing spell at Wisla Plock. They have a bunch of players who needed pathways open them for first team football at this level and this season will absolutely be sink or swim and the fate of Javor’s season will depend on how many floaters they’ve got.

Finally, Novi Pazar. It’s hard to know what to say about this club given that they are (rumoured to be!) immensely dodgy behind the scenes. Their incomings this seasons are certainly the most high profile of their three seasons in the top tier so far - Zan Medved was highly thought of in Slovenia but couldn’t hit the proverbial cow’s backside with a banjo at Celje last season and was sent packing from his loan early - plenty of xG but a serious lack of xFactor. Mitar Ergelas is a nice loan from Cukaricki also. But they really should have gone down in 20/21 (when they saved themselves by fixing matches) and last season also - they lack depth, they don’t look like they have goals in them - surely this season will be the one they finally drop.

The Mozzart Superliga has too many clubs and that’s not a particularly controversial opinion to hold. With sixteen sides in the league, we’re seeing this season that there may be becoming a definite top five or six (or a top two and a second four) and then everyone else as the quality of the sides lower down the league (and the financial stability of them) continues to lag far behind the better clubs in Serbia and clubs in a similar role in other nations. That we’re beginning to see other clubs such as Vozdovac and Mladost copy the Cukaricki model of backing youth and daring to be a sane, well run club in a nation where the top two clubs are solvent only because the state has a never ending patience of allowing them to run up debt (and unpaid taxes) is a definite positive. This season starts with a small amount of clubs looking better but the gap between them and the big two - Cukaricki in third were 38 points behind Partizan in second last season with Radnicki Nis a further 9 back. Those were the only clubs to amass even half of the total of Partizan, never mind Zvezda.

22/23 may well feel like the gap has closed at the top, but that gap begins the season as a chasm and the next nine months are unlikely to see that disappear entirely.

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thefootballlife · 2 years

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On promoting football in the former Yugoslavia

Occasionally, I like to do some very long things and this is the start of what will be one of them. As you reading this or getting linked to it on Social media may know, I’m based in the UK and have covered football in the former Yugoslavia for what feels like an age. In that time, it’s run up against glass ceilings feeling that this title race or this European run or this set of players may be the thing that makes the difference in terms of the wider popularity of the product(s) on show. That this moment might be the point that it crosses over from being something that merely exists to something that’s actually noticed outside of its little corner of the world.

But it hasn’t. Instead, we get the occasional good idea and the occasional notable result and then an immediate fading from the public consciousness outside of the small number of hardcores like me who avidly care about this sort of thing.

And hardcore is what you have to be as while there is a recognition that the former Yugoslavia has certain attributes, these tend to be around fan culture and, beyond that, the stereotypes are almost wholly negative and tainted by either older scandals or by other nations in the region. Thoughts of corruption and racism come to mind but, certainly in the north of the region, such issues are mercifully rare. What corruption there is in the south of the region is due less to entrenched dodgy people in positions of power and more due to the basic economics of clubs and players balancing their books and finding that while morals don’t pay the bills, they can actually become a tradeable commodity.

Many of the issues that are prevalent in the region are ones shared with many more prominent nations - the cost of watching games on TV, refereeing, etc - and some require a co-ordinated continental response to tackle rather than being something that a few clubs or a single FA can do. Some are purely local factors. I write this bit during the June Nations League games where I’m reading articles suggesting that more away fans will turn up to watch Slovenia-Serbia in Ljubljana than will home fans - that’s obviously an issue unique to the NZS. There are also issues that are prevalent in certain areas which aren’t in others - it’d be remiss not to mention current successes such as the state investment in stadiums in Serbia which, while probably not the best use of taxpayer money, is actually something the game needed.

But first, it’s important to set out what the game looks like now in the region by introducing what I like to call the Balkan Ladder as a concept.

THE BALKAN LADDER

The market in the former Yugoslavia has a distinct hierarchy and a distinct relationship with other markets and it’s important to recognise how everyone relates to each other and, in certain cases, don’t relate to each other. Some instances of exceptional players will see them skipping this altogether, but there is broadly a levelling up process in terms of quality, interest

There are around four distinct tiers within the region so to list them off and who they interact with in ascending order.

At the bottom of the food chain currently is Montenegro which is generally the poorest of the leagues in the region. While a couple of larger clubs in Buducnost and Sutjeska are very reputable and do produce some very good young players, the best prospects will be leaving Montenegro pretty quickly and, generally, will be on their way to the North East to Serbian clubs. Most transfers are free transfers and most outgoings from the nation are to the second tier of Serbian football rather than the top (albeit there’s a caveat I’ll come to in a moment). Per Transfermarkt, only 21 players have ever left the nation for a fee - this is likely an underestimate but not a massive one as many will go on frees for youth compesnation only. To underline the economic issues, as per transfermarkt, the Montenegrin record purchase is £68k - one of only three fees paid for a player that they have recorded.

Moving up is the relatively immature situation of the Kosovar league. Immature is a word I’ll often use to describe it because while the league itself has been around for a couple of decades, that it’s legitimacy and entry into UEFA is more recent, Kosovo does come with a bit of a phenomenon in that there are players who are well above the level Kosovo is at who still play in the league. As an example, in 2020, we saw Jetmir Topalli move straight from Kosovo to the top flight in Turkey and play at that level well and that wasn’t that weird but it would be weird if someone did the same from Montenegro because a similar player in Montenegro would have moved much earlier, likely to Serbia.

One other element about Kosovo is that, unlike other leagues, the main relationship is with a league outwith the former Yugoslavia, specifically with Albania. That relationship to the Superiore exists within Montenegro and North Macedonia also but on a more limited basis as it tends to be with clubs who are ethnically Albanian.

These two things will gradually settle the flip down as scouts start working the Kosovo beat more intensively and the Topallis, Velius and Baftius of this world start moving abroad at 18 rather than at 21. What we will likely see at that point is a lot of cross-pollination between the Kosovan and Albanian league system (as well as to the Albanian clubs in Montenegro and North Macedonia) with the top players being picked up by Croatian and Turkish clubs alongside clubs from diaspora communities (ie Switzerland). It is probably fair to expect that the overall quality of the league will drop slightly, and this ranking is based on where the league is right now, but I would not expect it to drop to the level of Montenegro for a while given the standard of what is coming through in each nation.

Finally, on this point, it’s probably fare to note that in terms of quality the Kosovan league isn’t wildly different to that of Albania given the Kosovan league is a bit less sketchy, but it’s also fair to note that Kosovo doesn’t have the established and trustworthy club production lines of, for example, a KF Tirana.

Next up are both Bosnia and North Macedonia. While the latter arguably has some more successful outcomes in continental football (and, more recently, in international football), both leagues serve a broadly similar purpose in terms of feeding into the top leagues in the region and such differences at the moment are part of the natural ebb and flow of talent production rather than being able to currently and confidently state that one is on a permanent rise or fall. For Bosnia, the top three external nations are Croatia, Serbia and Slovenia and it splits over time as pretty much 50-50 between players going into second tiers or top tiers. For North Macedonia, the biggest buyer is Albania but with an extra caveat that many of the most prominent deals in the antion are of imports from African and Latin American football who end up going to weird places (Azerbaijan, Qatar, etc) rather than there necessarily being a grand amount of logic to things happening. Both nations also have a comparability in terms of a couple of elements - players do move for relatively big fees with transfermarkt noting 11 historic sales over £250k from North Macedonia and 32 from Bosnia (albeit with many of those from North Macedonia coming more recently). In terms of clubs buying players, it is similar also with both nations records being around £200k and the total amount of players for whom fees were paid both around 15. Finally, both have a similarity in terms of having a small cabal of competitive sides - in Bosnia, you would reduce that to Sarajevo, Zeljeznicar, Borac, Zrinjski and maybe Velez and Siroki Brijeg if you’re being generous. In North Macedonia, that would be Vardar, Shkendija, and Shkupi with Rabotnicki having faded in recent years and Akademija Pandev on the way up.

Directly above them on the ladder is Slovenia. The Prva Liga’s place in the ecosystem is something that’s easy to place given it is acts as both a step up from the leagues above and also as a step between the first and second tiers of Croatian football - something evidenced by the amount of loans going from there to Slovenia. When one looks at the incomings from below them on the ladder, we see marquee players from Bosnia such as Ziljkic and Beganovic moving to Slovenia in 21/22. When it comes to outgoings from the league, we see a wider range of nations and fees with players going to the USA and Mexico as well as more predictable locations such as Austria to the North and Serbia and Croatia to the South. Unlike the previous nations in the ladder, fees between clubs in Slovenia aren’t that rate with money spent by Celje and Bravo this season on players from other clubs in the league which are on top of external sales. As a comparison to North Macedonia and Bosnia, Slovenia has 36 sales of players which are over £1m and 105 over £250k - something that compares very favourably to those other nations.

Finally, at the top of the ladder are Croatia and Serbia. Both leagues are very distinct to each other and it would be extremely fair to point out at this stage that the overall quality of the leagues is somewhat different to each other - the worst side in the Croatian top flight is much better than their counterpart in the Serbian Superliga. However, at the top end, there would not be that much difference in standard between Dinamo, Hajduk, Osijek, Partizan and Crvena Zvezda and all those clubs would have similar ambitions in terms of what they can realise in terms of transfer fees and what they would like to aim for in terms of European competitiveness. Fees between clubs with the leagues are more regular (particularly from the largest clubs) and players move into these leagues from a wider range of nations, particularly Croatia.

In terms of external markets, Hungary, as a league of comparable size to Croatia and Serbia and with ethnic ties to clubs in both nations shop in the region as do Austrian clubs, particularly in the north. We also see a far higher prevalence of players moving to Asia than we do in other regions - as an example, the highest amount of players travelling to play in the Uzbekistan Superliga are those moving from Serbia for a total cohort of 21 Serbs playing in the top flight there. As indicated above, that is one of the distinct differences between the two leagues at the top of the ladder but on that I’ll begin to touch on in the next section.

WEAKNESSES IN THE REGION

As is unlikely to surprise anyone, there are a lot of weaknesses in the unofficial system that has formed in the region and how it interacts with the rest of European football at large. Some of these are problems imposed from above as the Champions League continues to march towards closed shop status and the trickle-down economics of UEFA continue to reveal that what trickles down doesn’t always smell right. Some of these are problems that are figuratively structural, such as corruption. Some of these are issues that are literally structural, in terms of providing matchday atmosphere. Most of these issues are, however, ones with a remedy and there are no nations in which every single issue is present. But many are issues which would require cross-border co-operation to actually sort out - something which remains likely out of reach for political reasons.

Every single issue can be boiled down to one common denominator - money - and how nations have moulded their individual footballing structures to deal with that. Perhaps the most glaring example of this is between the two nations at the top of the ladder - Croatia and Serbia. Where Croatia has a ten team top flight which is, broadly, full of stable clubs who pay their bills, Serbia has a sixteen team top flight that is packed with small clubs struggling to get by. While some clubs in the latter have been able to get a comfort zone and think long term, the reality of most of the Serbian Superliga is that they exist day to day and that contracts are to be written but not necessarily to be honoured in full.

The first issue, which UEFA have to their credit attempted to fix, is the lack of access to continental competition. The introduction of the Europa Conference League has remedied that somewhat but it’s fair to note that the entire group cohort of the former Yugoslavia in 21/22 was four sides (Partizan, Zvezda, Dinamo Zagreb and Mura) which is lower than the total group participants of England, Netherlands, Spain, France, Germany and Italy (and equal to Portugal, Belgium, Denmark and Austria). The reality is that the vast majority of the sides qualifying for Europe through the league don’t ever get beyond the qualifiers and while forecasts for the access list come 2024 may mean a couple more sides from the region get group stage money, that is still a pretty low return.

Quite aside from monetary benefits, there are few people who would argue that playing against different sides is of a benefit to players. Regional co-operation does exist at youth level - something like the Kup Prijatelstva at U19 level is shown live on Sportklub and includes sides from all former Yugoslav UEFA members excluding Kosovo. This hasn’t ever threatened to lead to a senior version of a regional competition but were that to be an idea that UEFA were amenable to (with something like a Conference League Group Place to the winner) then the competitive element would be there at least with a requirement only to work out an amenable format and get TV coverage (two things which are, of course, harder than they look). It would better prepare sides for the rigours of continental football with the potential monetary benefit and, in a region where most sides play a maximum of 37-40 domestic games a season, is something where room exists in the schedule without that much crowbarring.

UEFA do need to identify that if they wish to level up the whole game on the continent, then the introduction of opportunities for competitive football on a regional level are something that have to be looked at for developing regions such as the Balkans, the Baltics plus Finland and the Caucasus nations - all nations which have shown history and capability to produce some fantastic players but also nations where domestic football has floundered due to economics and local competition. While it is not asking UEFA to recognise the failings of the Champions League in leaving some regions behind, it is asking UEFA to do something proactive about it to attempt to close that gap.

The next issue is that of corruption and match-fixing.

While it would be utterly fanciful to suggest that such issues don’t exist, it is fair to note that they are far rarer in certain leagues than in others. Some of this is partly historic - the original Yugoslav First League way back into the 1980s and beyond was not completely rigged but it is fair to state that every single club had money set to one side for a rainy day where a result was required. It came in various forms and in varying levels of subtlety from paying players off to simply ensuring that referees had a good time when attending matches. Some regions saw that continue beyond the break-up of Yugoslavia, in particular Serbia which devolved into a kleptocracy under Milosevic and where the basic attitude that money should buy games was allowed to become part of the natural order of things. It would be wholly wrong to suggest that efforts haven’t been made to clean things up, but the thing is so embedded in certain structures that such efforts run up against many a brick wall.

The forms of fixing that take place generally fit into two categories - the “you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours” of throwing away games to get repaid in kind later in the season variety and the paying players off variety. On the prior, by way of comparison with a similar league with two massive sides and a league split, the away records of Serbia’s big two compare very favourably with those of Celtic and Rangers (over a shorter period pre-split in Serbia also) with the same applying in reverse at the lower end of the table as well. There are few easy answers to that particular conundrum because that is a systemic issue that can only really be weeded out with changes in personnel at clubs and at the FA - even things like fit and proper person tests would be of limited use because of how wide the net would have to be cast to ensure that everyone who could organise that sort of thing was entirely on the up and up.

On the latter variety, that of players being got to, the solution is extremely simple on paper but equally difficult in practice. Using Serbia as an example (although it should be said this issue isn’t exclusive to them), in early 2017, FIFPro took the step of publicly stating that players should avoid signing contracts with Sebrian clubs because of worsening labour conditions in the nation - this included 68% of players not receiving wages on time. In 2014, Crvena Zvezda were barred from the Champions League due to unpaid player debts. In 2020, FIFPro stepped in again around a wage dispute at FK Borac - with one player reporting that they had been paid only three months of their 18 month contract and players going on hunger strike in aim of getting it resolved

This isn’t a Serbia only problem but it is, by and large, most prevalent and most publicised there. The problem, at its most simple, is money and whether clubs have the resources to actually pay their players and, if they don’t what do the players then do to actually pay their bills. Inevitably, some turn towards accepting money through illegitimate means given that while morals can fetch a price, they can’t keep the electricity on by themselves.

Such issues requires specific root and branch reform reviewing the sustainability of the clubs in the leagues. Using Serbia as an example, the total population accessible to league clubs (as, for obvious reasons, while many population totals include Kosovo’s population, they are unlikely to be going to Serbian games) is somewhere in the region of just under 7 million. A similar sized nation is Bulgaria, which has a smaller league system. As does Switzerland and Austria, whose populations are close to Serbia’s if one were to include Kosovo within the figure. While some smaller nations do also have 16+ sized top tiers (such as Norway), they don’t have the sustainability issues that Serbia does and those smaller nations have a vastly higher GDP per capita than Serbia does. The question therefore must be posed as to whether Serbian football is actually capable of supporting 16 sustainable top flight clubs, particularly given that the current TV deal signed with Arena Sport and the Serbian FA lumps the league in with the Cup and national team rights as well as sponsorship for somewhere around £7m a season in total for the job lot. It would, therefore, be fair to expect that clubs aren’t seeing all that much in broadcasting money given it’s divided 16 ways (before the second tier take a slice also).

While it’s also the case that the political environment in Serbia and the dominance of the SNS in many areas of life, including in football with many club chairmen from the party, undoubtedly stymies reform, this isn’t a piece to get all political. It is simply enough to point out that those in charge of clubs are rarely those best qualified to be in charge of clubs and that Serbia has suffered from a footballing brain drain that has meant a lot of logical improvements to the standard of the league - improvements that have been put in place elsewhere (not least Croatia in reducing the size of the league) seem unlikely. But if Serbia is ever going to actually combat corruption within the game, it has to start from the pragmatic viewpoint of how to make clubs able to pay the bills on time, every time and attempt to make the incentive to fix (ie getting lots of money) that much less pressing.

And as mentioned above, this problem isn’t exclusive to Serbia but the basic logic behind solving it remains the same. A player is unlikely to risk getting involved in match-fixing if they’ve got a healthy bank account and a reliable pay cheque. The fix for the corruption experienced has to be wide-ranging to ensure that it is completely ripped up from the roots.

One thing that Serbia has done well at is at building stadiums. Recently, we’ve seen the completion of the modern TSC stadium and projects are well on the way in Loznica, Leskovac and Zajecar. These smaller modern stadia are an important template in a league where you have a lot of older stadia - looking purely at the top flight (as there are many an oversized stadium outside of it, eg Smederevo) behind Crvena Zvezda and Partizan, Radnicki Nis’ Cair is 60 years old, Cika Daca in Kragujevac is over 70 years old and Karadorde in Novi Sad is pushing 100 years old. While those numbers aren’t necessarily bad in and of themselves, none of those grounds ran at an average attendance higher than 20% and that applies even in the pre-COVID world. Serbia is hardly alone in this issue but the trend is for large, older stadiums that soak up money to keep them in an operational state which, in turn, takes the funding away from the more pressing requirement to replace said stadiums with something more appropriate for a club’s needs.

The other issue in the region as a whole is that many stadiums are multi-purpose and have running tracks, etc. While what I’m about to say could rightly be accused of being a bit luddite, football clubs require football stadiums. Multi-purpose stadiums may well serve communities better, but for the basic aim of presenting a football game as an effective product, particularly at smaller grounds, having a great big athletics track that pushes the ends behind the goal 20 metres back from the actual pitch is a detriment. While, for some clubs, such a feature is of a historic benefit (eg at the Rajko Mitic Stadium), the majority of smaller clubs who generally have an average attendance well under 5,000, would be better served by a different design. Accepting that the actual matchday experience is a big part of football’s drawing power, ensuring that the grounds sides play in are designed for football.

Inevitably, that requires state intervention either in the form of direct funding or loans to clubs to ensure that facilities can be brought up to scratch - something that is palatable for a club run by a former Delije member like Serbia but something that would be less so elsewhere. Regardless, producing a scaleable stadium template that could be rolled out at sizes of something like 4,000, 8,000 and 12,000 that would include designated space for clubs to personalise areas of it (beyond having different coloured seats!) would be a worthwhile venture simply to give a template clubs can use and to provide a useful gauge of costs - the wonderful TSC Stadium at 4,500 cost €15m but, given how nice that ground is, it’s fair to say that it may be possible to trim that price slightly for other clubs. For somewhere like Slovenia, that could mean a state investment of around €100m to bring everyone up to the same level (and, on a personal note, some of that should be to sort out Bezigrad and get it back in use) but it would be an investment that would provide benefits in the interest in the game and in the finances of clubs (that can be ploughed into youth development and some sort of loan write-off based around investment in development would be a sound plan) that would bear fruit very quickly and provide the commensurate increase in standard and performance that such investment in infrastructure would require.

That is a relatively brief run through the structural weaknesses that pervade throughout the region. They are hardly the only ones - there is a suspicion hard boiled in at many clubs and fanbases of the illegitimacy of certain officials at FAs and certain referees that goes beyond the normal base level paranoia that exists in every football fan. No matter who you put in place, someone would be unhappy but FAs should not fear bringing in new brooms and be picking based on competence first and foremost, rather than politicking.

One could also talk at length about television coverage - the lack of coverage outside of the region of any of the leagues in spite of the qualities inherent in them and also the fact that the cluster of eternal derbies as individual games should be sellable on their own on a one off basis to non-domestic markets. Linking up with an online broadcaster such as OneFootball, viaplay or Croatia’s own SofaScore bringing in live streaming would put the leagues in the pockets of millions with little effort and provide a foot in the door to get more lucrative deals going forward. Co-ordination across the region on international sales would give a more attractive bundle given that it would mean that there would be marquee fixtures every game week and games that would fit timeslots that are generally devoid of live coverage (eg Friday early evening).

It’d be easy also to mention the proclivity of certain leagues (*cough*Slovenia*cough*) to put certain games on in the middle of a weekday, which is utterly counter-productive given the majority of viewers, be that live or in the lounge, are at work. In addition, one of the key features in some nations is that none of the domestic games clash - something that should pull some more fans through the gate but, for selling the league outside of domestic markets, makes things more difficult as everyone ends up clashing with each other by default. Some cross border co-operation on ensuring that the biggest games in the region don’t clash with each other (often is the time I’ve had to sit and choose between a big Slovenian game and a big Coratian game because they have overlapping slots on a Saturday and Sunday evening) because avoiding that happening will be beneficial for everyone’s viewing figures and help out bargaining positions come contract time. This isn’t asking to ensure that, say, Bravo don’t play Celje at the same time as Dinamo play Hajduk merely to ensure that Dinamo don’t play Hajduk at the same time as Olimpija play Maribor because, when your broadcasting deals are with broadcasters that go across the region (as SportKlub and ArenaSport do) scheduling big games against each other is only going to serve to eat your own potential share.

Nor have I mentioned the R word. It would be remiss of me not to mention that plenty of games in Serbia go ahead with “Kosovo is Serbia” signs present. It would be remiss of me not to mention that this past season has seen high profile racism incidents, such as those involving Jamaican player Norman Campbell. It would be entirely idiotic of me to start throwing forward suggestions on how to ensure racial harmony in countries I don’t live in. It is merely enough here to point out that it occasionally happens and people need to make sure it doesn’t.

Each of these points could reasonably occupy a few thousand words by themselves but, given I should impose some sort of restriction on myself, we’ll move on to the strengths in the region.

STRENGTHS

If you were to ask 100 people what football in the region is good at, most would say it’s at producing talent. There can be few regions where as much talent has come through per capita as the former Yugoslavia. There can also be few regions whose coaching talent has travelled as widely as from the region also - a lasting legacy of soft power starting from Tito offering coaches here, there and everywhere as part of the non-aligned movement. Ten nations excluding Yugoslavia and the successor nations have been taken to the World Cup by managers from the region.

The success of the region in this is as much a sign of the robustness of the development ladders as it is a sign of the robustness of the willingness to profit wherever you can on a player. Many move outside the region without ever putting a senior shirt on before eventually returning a few years later having had experience rarely higher than, say, Primavera level. Those who stay a bit longer may be encouraged to join locally big clubs rather than clubs outside the region because of politics, links that simply wouldn’t fly in the West (Zdravko Mamic, in particular) or with the promise that starring in the few sides that reach Europe will be more profitable with a sell on clause than getting money now. In a region where advanced stats don’t necessarily exist for every nation and every game (and where the hobbyist data analysis scene just isn’t a thing), that the region continues to produce talent that is often reaching senior football on look and feel alone is both a tribute to the coaching that exists and also a potentially unsustainable production line as football elsewhere evolves ahead of it.

Part of the reason of the region’s success is covered earlier with the Balkan Ladder section but the remainder should be explained by how that works in practice with game time. Using The Athletic’s piece on peak ages, we can see that most outfield players peak between 24 and 29. As such, we would class that period as a point where the balance of physical, technical and mental attributes are at their best balance. However, to fulfil much of that, you must have match-craft. This is where we find the much maligned gap between youth football and first team football and this is where the cross-border development ladder is so important because where a 19 year old at, say, Cardiff would have options limited to U23 football, a loan to a team that will play similarly, first team football or being released, the same player at Osijek would have the choice between youth football, a loan within the nation, a loan to a nearby nation that plays football differently, first team footbal, second team football and more.

There are both more opportunities for players to get senior football against experienced opponents and more opportunities for clubs and coaches to tailor development by sending players to surrounds that will assist their development the most. It’d be remiss of me not to mention Luka Modric going to Zrinjski Mostar as a youngster at Dinamo because they felt his need was to be tested in a more physical environment, and he rose to that challenge. While Modric is, of course, an outlier, the opportunity to play in different nations with different footballing cultures makes it harder to get a player’s development wrong and, crucially, means that players in the region get more senior football. While it will sound obvious, that is very important given that they are playing in a higher pressured environment against players who provide them with different challenges than those they would face in youth football or, for that matter, at a loan to a club with a similar culture. In addition, this also provides players with more opportunity to find their level and therefore raises the depth of the standard of leagues as a whole as players are more likely to reach their ceiling. The football ecosystem cannot thrive if you engage a policy that is directed to improve the top three or four teams at the detriment of teams lower down the footballing ladder and the system that is in place through much of the region is both top down and bottom up. Entire clubs pride themselves on being little more than finishing schools but by dedicating yourself to that sort of endeavour, those finished products go on for money that can be reinvested.

On top of this, a scout is going to look at aspects of game management when looking at a player. A 20yo with 70 senior appearances is always going to look more appealing through that microscope than one with 20 because they simply get “it” more.

Quite aside from playing talent, one key strength is that the cut through culturally of a Dinamo Zagreb or a Crvena Zvezda (or, to make my point, a Red Star Belgrade) is far higher than that of a similar sized club in a nearby nation because of the events that have happened in the region historically, be they on or off the field. They are big names in football, even if most people know them in passing rather than ever having taken the time to watch.

It is, of course, far easier to go on about weaknesses than it is strengths and, many of what I would perceive as strengths in terms of watching the football and getting used to the schedule of it, given each league has an extended winter break, would be something that many others would perceive as a weakness. Horses for courses and all that.

CONCLUSION

This, as you can tell, isn’t meant to be imposing some sort of personal perfect model on the region. It’s simply to list out what I perceive to be the biggest issues in the region and what could be things that contribute towards a solution or, at least, things I would do were I in charge. Were I asked for a perfect model, I would undoubtedly put as my three biggest wishes the introduction of senior cross-border competition, the upgrade and replacement of stadia and, on a purely selfish level, the introduction of international coverage of games (and, while we’re at it, the level of English in the region is good so why not do some English language coverage?). The direction of travel probably won’t bring those things to life but knowing what to aim for and adjusting it to what’s realistically deliverable is something worth identifying, even if many people won’t agree with my own priorities or views.

Football in the region has a heck of a lot going for it but it is also undeniable that it isn’t going to its full potential. The Balkan Ladder is a fabulous hierarchy for player production, but if you’re a fan at the bottom of the ladder, there’s not much to get excited about and, seemingly, not much opportunity to level up. If you’re watching football at a 20% full ground, then there’s not much to get excited about and there’s not that much incentive for you to brave a wet and windy day to go to a game. If you’re a scout, there’s some places without reliable advanced stats so it’s difficult to back up being excited about things.

All of this requires investment and, while this 6,000 word plus article could be summed up by just me shouting the word “MONEY” over and over, it’s inescapable that the biggest problems in the region require money going into clubs and that money going into the pockets of players. That needs every stakeholder coming together - UEFA, governments, clubs, FAs, player unions and fan groups - to work towards a) getting funding and b) that funding being used sensibly and sustainably.

Because the potential, the expertise and the care is there in the region and there in abundance. It needs to be harnessed.

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thefootballlife · 2 years

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The faded Dragon - Robert Prosinecki becomes new Olimpija boss

Olimpija Ljubljana are nothing if not ceaselessly entertaining. If one thought that managerial carnage and odd decisions were going to be consigned to the Mandaric years come the takeover of the club late last year, then you would have been proven emphatically wrong as Olimpija moved onto their third manager of the season today and it’s a name that few would have expected.

When the new owners came in, one of their first acts was to dispense with Savo Milosevic and bring in a new man, specifically Dino Skender, who had previously managed the club for the first half of the 2020/21 season and did so in a not all that impressive manner putting together a defensively solid and characteristically inconsistent side. When he was replaced with Goran Stankovic, it was no surprise.

Dino Skender, funnily enough, is also the brother of Olimpija’s technical director Marin Skender who was, yes, appointed when the new owners came in. These two facts, much like the Skenders, are related. Perhaps unsurprisingly, given that Skender took a fun, attacking side from Milosevic, added a bunch of players such as Matko, Pilj and Prtajin, and turned that side into a defensively solid and characteristically inconsistent side (with one key issue we’ll get to in a second), Skender wasn’t especially popular with the Olimpija fanbase.

Exacerbating this was the baffling and, in hindsight, absolutely destructive change of goalkeeper from Nejc Vidmar, who had been at the club since 2016 serving them veery admirably and consistently, to Ivan Banic, who had spent the latter part of the autumn benchwarming behind Dominik Kotarski at Gorica in the HNL. Banic, at the start of this season, was reasonably well thought of and the change in keeper was entirely at the behest of Dino Skender, who seemed not to get along with Vidmar and wanted him exiled. To be fair to Banic, he wanted first team football that he wasn’t going to get behind the rapidly improving Kotarski.

To also be fair to Banic, his Olimpija spell has swiftly turned into his own personal hell. Olimpija sit in third, seven points behind Maribor. A kind assessment of Banic’s personal contribution to that gap would say that, had Vidmar been between the sticks, the gap would be at worst one point, given Banic is at least directly responsible for losses to Domzale and Celje. With Dino Skender’s biggest call in the transfer market and absolute bust, and that call being to exile a player who rightly has a large amount of credit in the bank with Olimpija fans, it was hardly a surprise that he eventually paid for that error with his job.

So, Dino Skender went after a 1-1 draw with Domzale that he could probably consider himself a little unlucky to not have won given Domzale’s goal was a wondergoal and that Olimpija ended up playing much of the second half with ten men after Mustafa Nukic got sent off for an attempted over-the-shoulder scissors kick that connected only with the head of a defender. And his replacement?

When you consider Olimpija’s new owners, you have to consider that their key task at the club is to bring stability after the wild years of Mandaric. That they should be able to bring in a manager of quiet competence who is used to a longer term project and who can build the side bit by bit to match the exploits on the continental stage of, say, Mura this season.

Instead of this, after hiring and firing the technical director’s brother (which, if nothing else, should make Christmas awkward), they’ve gone and hired Robert Prosinecki on a contract to the end of the 23/24 season.

Robert Prosinecki, the player, is arguably one of the most enigmatic and talented players to ever grace the game. At his peak, he was a generational talent who made simple things seem like genius because his mind and instinct worked on a pace higher than his peers. That is Robert Prosinecki the player.

Robert Prosinecki the manager?

Prosinecki has been in management since 2010. His time at Crvena Zvezda saw the side go backwards. He took Kayserispor from 5th to the relegation spots in his year there, crossing the 12/13 and 13/14 seasons. His spell at Azerbaijan was one of their best but his time as Bosnia-Herzegovina saw initial promise soon turn into the side entering a nosedive that they haven’t yet recovered from, topped off with some odd behaviour like resigning and then unresigning a couple of days later in late 2019 and then actually leaving about six weeks later. He returned to Kayserispor, which went badly, then moved to Denzilispor, which went worse.

Prosinecki has had success, in particular during his early time as BiH manager. He hasn’t really had success as a club manager - given that success as Crvena Zvezda manager is ultimately judged by either winning the league or taking over a poorer side mid-season and making clear progress towards winning the league, that a spell in which Prosinecki failed really to do either is his most successful club spell isn’t exactly going to inspire confidence. The name Prosinecki inspires a short-term positive reaction but his CV shows that he hasn’t really come out of that with much in the way of positives in the medium term as a manager. Prosinecki has said the right things in terms of wanting the side to be positive, attacking and so on - given that Olimpija do have a very good attacking roster, that’s a start - but for a manager that feels like a short term fix designed to boost their flagging title aspirations, a two year deal is odd. For a club that should crave stability and long term planning, Prosinecki doesn’t seem like the ideal fit.

But then again, it’s Olimpija. Doing slightly puzzling things is kind of their whole deal.

This is another in a long line of them.

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thefootballlife · 2 years

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The Die is Cast - Paul Simpson joins in a day of drama at Carlisle United

23rd in League Two and with performances only getting worse, the inevitable became the actual as Carlisle United did what the clubs around them were doing and rolled the dice to sort a new manager and hope that it would be enough to turn things around. Much like Stevenage, Oldham and Walsall, they moved quickly to bring someone in - in Carlisle’s case, former manager Paul Simpson.

But the return of Simpson was not the only change at the club as director of football David Holdsworth has also departed the club with the short statement around his departure stating that he will not be replaced. As last rolls of the dice go, Carlisle United’s board have made one that will please fans as much as any move they could possibly have made.

But pleasing fans is one thing, saving the club’s skin from falling into the National League is quite another. How did the the club get to a point where this move was even required and will it actually work?

It is fair to say that few fans will argue that much that both departures today were required. Carlisle’s form under the management of Keith Millen was at an all time low and the recruitment through the past two windows with Holdsworth as DoF has, ultimately, claimed two managers and left the club no better for it. It’s also fair to say that compelling excuses exist for both men also. Holdsworth had been getting some of those in for a little while.

Keith Millen did have a new manager bounce. Carlisle’s issues under Chris Beech were that they couldn’t defend a set piece for toffee and there weren’t much in the way of goals in the side. Over the short caretakership of Gavin Skelton and the early period of Millen, Carlisle became more resolute from set plays to match that they were already rather mean from open play. Attack wasn’t sorted but the work at the back was enough to earn tight victories over Walsall, Stevenage, Scunthorpe and Bradford around the festive season to suggest hope. January was to be a month of renewal where Millen’s work would be supplemented by Holdsworth’s recruitment.

It didn’t pan out that way.

While some attacking decks were cleared and Omari Patrick returned to the club permanently early in the window, most of the incoming work was left to the final day of the window where five players came in - two youngsters from Championship squads, the returning Jamie Devitt and Forwards Tobi Sho-Silva and Kristian Dennis. A week prior, Dynel Simeu came in on loan from Southampton with a purported clause that means he has to start as part of the loan.

Whatever anyone’s opinion about the quality or otherwise of these signings, what couldn’t have been guessed would be that on 1 February against Salford, Carlisle would lose their first choice centre back and right back to injury in the first half, neither of whom have been in the side since. From having a solid base to work from, Keith Millen suddenly had a makeshift defence that featured a central defensive pairing which had a total of four senior appearances between them prior to the start of this season. Carlisle have conceded ten in four earning one point since the window. If Keith Millen wishes to make a defence of his time at the club, then there it is made for him - he fixed a problem then saw everyone get injured and that problem get broken all over again.

Which leads us to Holdsworth. He gave an interview to the website over last weekend firmly placing the responsibility for signing Simeu on loan on Millen, getting his excuses in early over the signing of a player who had not impressed in his early games. As if on cue, Simeu then had a hand in all three Swindon goals in Carlisle’s woeful home loss this past weekend.

(Bafflingly, Holdsworth said also in his interview that the cost of scouting prevented him from looking to add to the recruitment team this season. Just to be clear, in case I’m accused of bias here, I contacted Holdsworth directly and offered to help for free earlier in the season - I have scouting experience at a higher level than League Two - to keep my hand in and, to be honest, because I actually enjoy doing it. I received no response. If I didn’t, then it does beg the question how many of the very many people who are prepared to do this work for free were also turned away. Believe me, a lot of people knock on the door wanting nothing more than experience only to get a foot on the recruitment ladder)

Carlisle, to be fair, do have issues around getting players to come to the club - debt related to previously covered financial issues necessitates that they are low payers, location away from most clubs means that those comparatively low pay packets become even less attractive. Reading between the lines of Holdsworth’s words, deals fell through because Carlisle were budgeting to the summer only and players who have families to uproot want the security of at least 18 months on their contract. That is an entirely fair reasoning at this, or any, level and players would rightly eye the club’s relegation predicament and think that they’d need a bit more to take the risk of the black mark of losing league status going into their CV. When your earning potential is measured in a career that will take you likely to 35 at the upper end, it’s perfectly understandable why a frontier club in a dogfight is pretty low on your list of preferred employers.

This explains some of what has happened today. From one perspective, Holdsworth and Millen had lost the fans - Holdsworth some time ago - but the decisions taken are short term plasters rather than being indicative of some sort of long term plan. Paul Simpson has been confirmed as manager to the end of the season - Simpson is rightly a Carlisle legend for his efforts during his first spell at the club which saw him almost avoid relegation in his first season (having been hopelessly detached at halfway) before leading the club to two consecutive promotions through the Conference playoff and then in winning League Two. Between 2006 and now he has, of course, led England U20 to the U20 World Cup but his club spells tended to run out of steam.

However, this task where he is taking over someone else’s side is markedly different to his efforts in putting a side together during his first spell. Simpson’s task is to imbue this side with resolve rather than renewal, to organise and man-manage rather than build. All this eleven years after his last role as the main man of a Football League club.

Fun fact - the last Carlisle manager to have a near eleven year gap between club jobs? Keith Millen.

That’s not to suggest doom or anything like that but having a gap like that in any role is an extra difficulty to overcome. While he is undoubtedly going to be sharper than Millen due to his heroics in international age-level management, it’s still a challenge as there are things you do as a manager that coaching or assisting don’t necessarily keep you prepared for.

That may seem unnecessarily negative and unfairly so. Let’s be blunt - when it comes to finding a person to make clear to the squad not only what is expected of them but also what league football means to the fabric of the city, then I could think of no-one I would want in the dugout more than Paul Simpson. If he, the man who was with Carlisle at their lowest and raised them to perhaps their highest watermark of the past three decades, cannot inspire a performance from this squad then the squad, bluntly, was never going to be good enough. No-one will blame him for that.

But Simpson, as strong a shot in the arm as he undoubtedly is, is also a sign of other change needed. Holdsworth is not being replaced at this time, Simpson is at Brunton Park till the end of the season and no longer at this point. Whatever happens between here and May, Carlisle United will be undergoing massive change this summer - the club will need a director of football, a role that won’t necessarily keep them up between here and the end of the season, but who will be of massive use after that point. The club will very likely need a new manager. The club will need new direction on the pitch and that’s before anyone says anything about the ongoing financial issues that impact everything the club does. That will all happen whether Carlisle start next season in League Two or in the National League. At that point, a lot of big decisions will have to be made that will have a far greater bearing on the future of Carlisle United than any decision made on a grey Wednesday in February.

But the decisions of today were, as much as they will personally pain Holdsworth and Millen, ultimately the inevitable and the correct ones. For the club’s sake, the next couple of big calls have to be the right ones too.

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thefootballlife · 2 years

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A few thoughts on the Croatian title race… Late last night, outside Gradski Vrt stadium in Osijek, well over a thousand fans gathered with more pyrotechnics than are currently sat on the Ukrainian border. There wasn’t a match on or a protest or anything like that - they came to see the unveiling of Kristian Lovric, the now former Gorica player who has consistently been the HNLs best over the past couple of seasons. For a fee of €2m plus a sell on fee, the sort of money that isn’t regularly thrown around at domestic transfers in Croatia (particularly when one of the clubs involved isn’t Dinamo), Osijek wrapped up negotiations with Gorica that had dragged on with the biggest sort of statement they could possibly make. In a spring where they entered with real ambitions of winning the league, Kristijan Lovric is the player signed to go on and do just that.

Lovric isn’t just one of the best players in the division, but he’s also one of the most consistently entertaining. He shoots - a lot. He scores - a lot. And those goals tend to be the sort of goals that end up on highlight reels. This move, to put aside what is going to be the thrust of this piece, is at the right time for him - a move to a prominent side just when Gorica are falling away that gives him a) a very decent contract, b) a bigger stage on which to enhance his national team credentials ahead of Qatar, c) more chance at getting European group stage football that may bring a life changing move afterwards and d) allows Gorica to get a decent fee for a player with under 18 months left on his contract.

But for Osijek, Lovric clearly means more than all of that. If signing Mijo Caktas was meant to be a statement of intent towards their title challenge, Lovric must be seen as a statement of intent towards a title win. Much like Manchester United bringing in Cristiano Ronaldo last summer, Osijek bringing in Kristijan Lovric is the sort of deal where the expectation is that it will deliver silverware and anything but achieving that goal will be considered a bit of a let down. Which, given we’re talking about Osijek, a side that have never won the title, is quite the weight of expectation.

Putting the weight of expectation to one side, there is the weight of history on the Dalmatian coast as Hajduk have assembled a team that can win a title. Add on top of that Rijeka’s outsider run and the small matter of Dinamo Zagreb, for whom winning titles is less an expectation and more a sort of dynastic birthright and you can see that there is one heck of a run in coming our way. To be cliche - whoever wins, fans win.

Aside from such glib statements that are intended to get you to watch a very good league, the overall impression of the HNL as a league on the rise is hard to shake given that the nation’s big four in Dinamo, Rijeka, Hajduk and Osijek have come out of the winter window with attacking rosters that are impressive to say the least and that there are now a few factors that seem to be beginning to come together to provide not just a short term boost to the league through a ding-dong title race but a medium term boost through off the field factors.

Those off-field factors are most obvious at Osijek. While Osijek do enjoy a monetary advantage over most sides thanks to their Hungarian backing, it’s also fair to say that this window marks one of the first times that that has shown itself in terms of Osijek flexing muscles in the transfer market. Outside of confirming the loans of Ramon Mierez and Yevgen Cheberko into permanent moves - something form made a no brainer - they haven’t spent massive sums and have tended to bring in players with an upside rather than the finished article. Bringing in Lovric and Caktas are obvious changes to that sort of policy from build up to win now. This year marks not only a change in footballing outlook, it marks a change in facilities as the new Pampas stadium will open in the summer. Moving from the older and too big Gradski Vrt is an obvious modernisation of the club (and provides Croatia with an impressive stadium - a tight, steep and fully covered 12.5k one) but, along with the stadium, comes a whole new training complex attached to it that will give the club facilities that are the envy of every club in the region.

But other factors will impact clubs. Hajduk could point to plans to upgrade Poljud, more than one club could say the same about the Kranjceviceva in Zagreb. More importantly is the situation around TV rights. This season was always going to be the final season of the current TV deal and, in 2020, a deal was announced with Magine to sell the rights for a decade, brokered by Rijeka chair Damir Miskovic. However, the inital payment date for this has come and gone and the TV rights for next season on are up for grabs once more.

For many leagues, this would constitute a crisis. However, for the HNL right now, it represents an opportunity - part of the reason the deal fell through was because domestic broadcasters didn’t want to pay a third party for something they knew they could deal direct with the HNS for. Part of the reason the HNS weren’t too bothered is because the media landscape in the region has changed since 2020 to a point where a new bidding process will be more competitive and is unlikely to leave them short of cash. The current deal that runs out was so pitiful that it would be nigh on impossible to fail to substantially improve upon it. That these new negotiations happen to coincide with the most intriguing title race in many a year is one of those happy coincidences that will show directly up in bank accounts from next season on.

Onto that title race and perhaps the one common denominator between the four contenders is in having an eminently likeable enigma in attack - Orsic at Dinamo, Muric at Rijeka, Livaja at Hajduk and now Lovric at Osijek.

Of the four, Rijeka are the easiest to dismiss. In an arms race where all of their competitors have done something to go all out, Rijeka have spent the winter showing just how good Goran Tomic must be to get this side in the mix in the first place. For a side that needed defenders, two starters were sold with fringe players that could have made an impact in Galesic, Galovic and Braut making their way out on loan. Sava Cestic is a coup of a signing but the side is weaker and, should they experience depth issues, they will be entirely self inflicted. If you want to make the case for them, Josip Drmic is as reliable a striker as they come, the best poacher in the league, and Robert Muric is a talent that can open any defence but has a habit of going missing in the big games - given Rijeka have lost to both Dinamo and Osijek this spring, it may be that they play the role of spoilers to other sides rather than actively getting involved in the title race. They will have Tomic to thank and Miskovic to blame for whatever this season ends up with.

Perhaps the out and out strongest first team may be that of Hajduk. If everyone is fit, then there can be little doubt that a front four of Marko Livaja, Nikola Kalinic, Stipe Biuk and Emir Sahiti is a handful for any defence. Since appointing Valdas Dambrauskas as manager, they have been on a tear - being unbeaten is one thing, but they are scoring for fun racking up three or more in six of the nine league games Dambrauskas has been in charge for. Beating Dinamo at Maksimir was a statement of a result and fans of good storytelling will probably point to the fact that the final day of the season has Dinamo hosting Hajduk for what could be the grandest finale of all. But while Hajduk’s first choice line up is fantastic, their depth leaves a little to be desired compared to Dinamo and Osijek. Were they to lose Livaja for any length of time, you’d be worried about their attacking production. Hajduk are very good and will be a big danger in this title race, but they will need things to fall nicely in terms of fitness and luck for them to become champions.

Osijek pushed Dinamo all the way last season but this season has been more of a slog. Ramon Mierez’s exceptional 20/21 hasn’t repeated (but his work rate is still faultless) and they have had to content themselves with simply being very, very hard to beat and hope the goals come from somewhere - after 23 games, no player has more than four goals. As a defensive unit, they are settled, organised and have two options in every position. The question about Osijek, a question that was there last season as well, was if they had enough in attack to actually put sides away with enough regularity to not lose the title because of their rate of draws. That is the conundrum Lovric is there to solve.

To be clear, Osijek’s attacking roster is now ridiculous. Mierez was exceptional last season and can score in volume. Fiolic and Kleinheisler supporting from midfield mix energy and craft and both are capable at a level above Croatia. Their supposed fringe options in Amer Hiros and winter signing Kristian Fucak have already shown plenty of growth and contributed moving to a higher level in the HNL than they had played at before. To top it all off, Mijo Caktas was to Hajduk through 2020 what Marko Livaja is to them now and, if you need someone to get shots off and provide threat from the wing, Kristijan Lovric is a man who shoots more than anyone in the nation and perhaps in world football and who also happens to be one of the best set piece takers anywhere in the world. If Osijek were looking for a final piece of the puzzle in terms of making them a more exciting attacking prospect, Lovric and Caktas are how you go about finding that.

Which leaves Dinamo. Dinamo are strong but, like Osijek, haven’t quite fired on all cylinders this season. Keeping Mislav Orsic will be key for them - he’s already scored important goals since extending his contract at the end of January - and Pero Bockaj has slotted in perfectly. While taking Bockaj, Osijek’s most important player (and one whose personal circumstances mean he’s unlikely to rise above Croatia), was likely meant to secure them a title, Dinamo still are missing key pieces. Bruno Petkovic isn’t being used as a striker that much, even losing his place to the previously discredited Komnen Andric. Their spring form has seen three wins from three but they’ve been three distinctly unimpressive wins and while they have more options in the centre of midfield than in a long time (Ademi, Franjic, Bulat, Music, Ivanusec, Tolic, Gojak), the emergence of Josip Sutalo at the centre of defence has been essential to keep that together. Dinamo are Dinamo - they’re a dynasty in Croatian football but this is a squad that has a lot of good but, outside of Orsic, not much in the way of great and, dare one say it, they might not have the best squad in the league right now.

Whoever wins, such competition is undoubtedly good for Croatian football. In a way, it’s a pity this wasn’t two seasons ago when Croatia’s UEFA coefficient was a bit more beneficial in terms of potentially getting sides into European group stages because in Dinamo, Osijek and Hajduk, you have three squads that are, right now, unquestionably good enough to belong on that stage and having three (or four) strong sides who are actively competing with each other and who are all reasonably financially sane can only be good for the long-term health of the Croatian league. We don’t have to wait long to see them throwing haymakers at each other either - next weekend (26/27 Feb) sees Hajduk host Rijeka and Osijek host Dinamo in a weekend bound to have title implications for all four sides.

It might just end up being Europe’s best title race.

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thefootballlife · 2 years

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The Football Life interviews... Dejan Grabic

Over the past few years, there have been few success stories in Slovenian football as great as the rise of NK Bravo and their head coach Dejan Grabic. Having taken over the club in the second tier in 2017, he took the club to promotion in 2018/19 and, now in their third season in the top flight, Bravo have become a mainstay of the top flight finishing sixth in their first season and currently sitting fourth in the league at the conclusion of the winter break. My thanks to Dejan Grabic and the PR team at Bravo for taking the time to answer my questions around the long game at Bravo and Dejan's thoughts on Slovenian football in general.

You’ve been at Bravo for nearly five years now - almost three years longer in role than any other current manager in the Prva Liga. Do you believe that your longevity in the role is a key reason behind the club’s success?

DG - "NK Bravo is a club that puts a lot of effort into continuity at all levels. Come April it will be five years since I became the head coach at the club. It is similar with other members of the professional team. Because of this, we have time to calmly develop our game model and to develop the players. Similarly, we want to have our team as constant as possible. Because we are mostly financed from the sale of players, there are a lot of departures, but that is our mission. We are trying to replace players who are moving to a higher level with young players with high development potential from our youth program or elsewhere. The fact that we have been together for so long is very important for our results on the pitch and also for the business side of the club."

We’ve seen Bravo do an impressive job of developing players in the short and long term - players such as Igor Vekic, Roko Baturina, Sandi Ogrinec, David Brekalo and many more have gone on to big moves directly from the club. What do you think is unique to Bravo that makes the club so successful in bringing players through?

"We must not forget Jaka Bijol, Domen Gril, Aljoša Matko, Milan Tučić, Vanja Drkusić, ... I could go on and on. These are all players who have managed to jump two or three levels higher than our league. The success of these players is a mixture of the good environment we offer them, the planned and quality work of the coaching profession and good scouting. Every year we try to add as many players from our youth drive as possible. It is up to them, however, when they manage to get to the level of becoming standard members of the first team. As for scouting... In previous years, we have learned very well to filter players that we think have development potential and are suitable for us the way we play. So we can narrow down the selection. The vast majority of potential reinforcements come in a one- or two-week trial. That’s when we get a closer look at their footballing abilities as well as their character."

Over the past year, we’ve seen the market within Slovenia change as clubs with European windfalls such as Celje and Mura have invested quite large sums in bringing in younger players. Have you found that increased competition for youth players a challenge?

"So far, we have never paid compensation for any player. The fact that the mentioned clubs have started to pay decent compensation for Slovenian players seems positive to me. On the other hand, we will see what this will mean for us. We will probably be able to make a good transfer within Slovenia as well. There is less and less romance in football today. Players, parents, agents are increasingly opting for current money rather than a good career path."

Each season in the Prva Liga has seen Bravo bring in a player in the winter break who has proven to be a very effective striker. With many clubs planning a couple of transfer windows ahead, is that something that you aim to do each season or have things been more reactive? Do you look for something different in a winter signing than you do a summer one?

"The fact that we usually get higher quality in the winter transfer window is more of a coincidence than a rule. It’s true that we got the most effective players in the winter. We would like to have a similar team throughout the season. But we are currently in a financial situation where we can not assemble a team exclusively with players under our contract. In previous years, we got quite a few players on loan from bigger clubs because we weren’t able to cover their entire salaries. So we got quality players that we couldn't otherwise afford. However, it is true that this is how we develop a player of another club and with their transfers we do not get the money to invest back in the team. Years ago we had 4 or five loan players, at the moment we only have one."

Every season under your management so far has seen an improvement in league position. Are you now at the point where your ambition for the club is to challenge for the title?

"We are very ambitious, but also very realistic. In no case do we want to deviate from our mission and our way of working. This is the development of young players, the development of the coaching staff and our financial self-sufficiency. So far, we are doing great in all areas. If our organic growth continues, we will also enter European competitions at some point."

Turning away from Bravo, the style of play in Slovenia tends to be a little slower and less pressing based than many leagues. How do you feel this impacts the standard of the league and its competitiveness on the continental stage?

"The description of our league is quite correct. It does not mean that it is not of good quality, but it is a bit slower than for example the Austrian league, which is very close to us. We observe that players from our league are less competitive abroad due to this fact when they succeed in a transfer. That is why the style of play in our club is adapted to faster leagues, because we want our players to do well in the better leagues after the transfer and stay there. Years ago, Celje played with a young team very fast and modern football with a lot of pressure. In my opinion, they had a team for places 4 to 7 on the championship scale in terms of individual quality. But they became champions. A large part of the success of the club was Dušan Kosič, who was at the helm for three years. And we are again at the continuity and systematic work."

The Prva Liga currently only provides a couple of players to the national side. What do you think can be done to improve that? Is there one change you’d make to Slovenian football to improve the standard of the game?

"It doesn't even matter how many players from our league are in the national team. Our league will be more and more developmental, so the better players will always move abroad. More important is the question of how to produce more quality players who can play in more developed leagues. Therefore, I would try to change the style of play in the league and in the national team and adjust the work in youth drives in Slovenia."

On a personal level, which managers do you most try to style yourself around? Are there things you’ve seen from other clubs that you’ve implemented or would like to put into place at Bravo?

"I don’t have a role model among coaches. I have great respect for the knowledge and also the diversity of each coach. The philosophies of Rinus Michels and Johann Cruyiff are very close to me. Lately, however, I have been studying a lot and delving into the German coaching school, because this is the closest thing to what our club needs."

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thefootballlife · 2 years

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A response to Mitja Viler

After over a decade at Maribor sandwiched between spells at Koper, Mitja Viler retired from football officially last month and, since then, has been moving into a role in journalistic fields. Most recently, via Nogomania, he published an article explaining his thoughts on Slovenian football and the media that touches on a few business points. As it’s not something I talk about too much, I wanted to take the opportunity to hijack/respond to Viler’s article while also providing a bit of depth and background to readers not familiar with the situation as it is. I’ve shortened Viler’s article (which can be read on Nogomania) to 8 main points as follows, and I’ll respond to each in turn…

Slovenian clubs don’t embrace the media enough but they are a necessary evil. As a result, the public interest in the league is lower than it should be

This is pretty hard to deny. From a logical perspective, the Slovenian league should be a reasonably easy sell to foreign markets - there are strong cultural ties to the nations directly to the south, north and west of them and a high saturation of English (and German) speakers meaning that the production of content for other nations is probably there within the staff that are already employed by the league.

So, that the league (and clubs) don’t actually produce content that is ever really outside of the Slovene language is part one of the missed opportunity. This is particularly compounded by the fact that while the Slovene language shares a lot with, say, Croat, speakers outside of Slovenia are rare. Of the official EU languages, none aside from Luxembourgish and the Baltic languages have fewer speakers. In short, if you produce your content only in Slovene, then you’ll only ever really be heard within Slovenia.

Which means you then turn your attention naturally to whether clubs do enough within their domestic market.

First off, it’s fair to note that unlike, say, the UK or even neighbouring Croatia, most Slovenian outlets are paywalled - if one were to list the main online outlets you have the football specific Nogomania which is free, Ekipa24 which is free but so ad-heavy that it’s horrible to navigate, the Maribor local Vecer (which is paywalled), the main nationals Delo (paywalled) and Dnevnik (soft paywall). The vast majority of their coverage is short, even Nogomania. Arguably the closest to regular long-form commentary was the Ofsajd email Newsletter from Jasa Lorencic otherwise coverage is broadly match reporting and the occasional interview as opposed to opinion pieces. So the actual depth of reporting you have in most nations and the hot takes that are the foundations of much of social media commentary simply doesn’t really exist in Slovenia. So as much as Viler is correct in that clubs rarely pull the curtain back to the media, there’s also not much in the way of pressure from the media to get that curtain pulled back.

What this means is that Slovenia doesn’t really have a national conversation about football - it lacks the buy in from the clubs (more on that in a sec), it lacks the divisive opinions from the press and it also lacks the accessibility/budget to easily correct that.

Club engagement between games is very low and it’s hard to find out basics such as if a player is injured or not

This is also hard to debate. From a me this time last year perspective, assisting with recruitment at a club in the UK, the sheer lack of information as to why player x isn’t playing at a given time or why they had a break was massively frustrating given that such a large part of looking at players is to gauge their injury history. That sort of thing is the most basic level of information that needs to be shared if you’re a club actively wanting to sell your players abroad because if you have a player who misses a few games, every club would like to know if that was because of a recurring muscle issue or because they tripped up at home and dislocated their shoulder. That sort of thing matters.

And club engagement is certainly inconsistent - if anyone should know that, it’s Mitja Viler. His final club were Koper and their last tweet was quote tweeting his retirement announcement.

Viler retired over a month ago.

This isn’t to say that there aren’t clubs who engage with fans and produce more content - Maribor, Mura, Olimpija, Bravo, Domzale, Tabor Sezana and Celje - but those that don’t are really obvious with it. Koper we’ve mentioned already, Radomlje seem to use Instagram only as do Aluminij. Even those I’m praising there rarely have anything more insightful than team line-ups, photos and plugs for merch. Arguably the most “good” football content comes from the Navijaska Cona initiative that is sort of an instagram fan portal for the league (that replaced and expanded upon the Sportal Goool! Goals service) which, even then, tends to show the paucity of interest in the league given that, half a season in, their most fan popular club is Bravo, with 455 “cheers”. There’s clearly an issue with engagement but it needs clubs to buy in to that in terms of having the video editing software, the imagination and, crucially, the budget to actually do so. Is it really fair for anyone to go out and say that Aluminij are letting the league down with their lack of engagement when they average 273 fans attending home games this season? There’s three other clubs with under 500 and only three with over 1,000. As such, the onus on putting together content ends up on the shoulders of volunteers or people at the clubs who are doing media stuff as a bit of a side hustle. Chicken and Egg.

Players don’t get hyped enough making it difficult to actually sell players (eg Maks Barisic)

This is perhaps the most interesting (and disputable) point that Viler made. Barisic, as an example, bobbed around the lower end of Italian football before moving to Koper and then coming into his own this season thanks to being given plenty of freedom within Koper’s tactical system. As such, he’s perhaps not the actual best example of a player a Slovenian club could make money on.

But the point isn’t necessarily wrong - only three players left Slovenia for fees this summer (Vombergar, Kolobaric, Ivanovic) with only six the season prior. If we compare that to the nation directly above Slovenia in the coefficient rankings (Slovakia), six fewer players left for other nations this season and the season prior is broadly even (although I think transfermarkt’s data there is a bit iffy!) - value-wise, Slovakia’s departures abroad this season comes to a value of around £12m, Slovenia’s around £1.6m.

So why is that? Well, for one, Slovenia’s style of football is a bit different to many places. It’s a great development environment for technical players but from the perspective of looking to bring in a player from the Prva Liga, the culture shock of moving to, say, the UK is that much greater than bringing in players from other places. Added to that, even Slovenia’s best players have issues - Mitja Lotric at Celje was sensational, but put in the Austrian second tier and he didn’t seem to make the grade. Now, that could be a case of simply it not being the best environment or fit for him but he’s hardly the only example you could put forward that’s similar. In spite of footage, etc being much easier to find for Slovenia than many nations, fewer people are looking.

There is also an element of hype there too but it’s also hard not to point out that Slovenian clubs are rarely on the bigger stage of European group football - Celje were able to sell players in 2020 because they had a big talent in Vizinger and others, Mura may be able to sell this winter if they so wish because of the big Conference League performances of players such as Zan Karnicnik. But it’s not a shop window Slovenian clubs are regularly in. Throw all those issues together of style, formbook and exposure and you get depressed values.

The media itself often isn’t confrontational or insightful enough to maintain interest.

It’s not, which given that Olimpija have been endlessly entertaining throughout the past few years behind the scenes and that an empire at Maribor has fallen apart is a real shocker. Part of the reason I give so much time and prominence to Slovenia’s football is because it is endlessly entertaining and not in the shabolic way that, say, Serbia is. It provides something that is visibly different to what I could get on Sky Sports, it has provided multiple brilliant title races in the past few years and, save that Slovenian referees seem to have a drastically different interpretation of the word “waterlogged” to anywhere else in the world, it very rarely provides any sort of negative headline. It is simply good football presented in a good way delivered in a good environment.

But not in an exciting way. One of my favourite moments of last season anywhere was the Filip Knezevic goal for Proleter Novi Sad where the commentator spontaneously turned into a machine gun. Most Slovenian commentators don’t deliver much in the way of emotion and don’t necessarily give a reason for a viewer to get invested (quite aside from the fact it’s not in my native language, it’s easy to tell the difference in tone between excitement and flat). I believe there are other reasons at play there which leads to…

Schedules, etc aren’t built for the audience watching at home (eg Bravo-Radomlje played at 3 in the afternoon on a Tuesday)

Bravo-Radomlje is a great example but far from the only one. Slovenia has a schedule that’s quite regular in the region (ie Games don’t overlap, tends to be one game Friday, two Saturday, two Sunday) but games also rarely overlap on weekdays, particularly given that they have to stick to the (frankly really bloody stupid) UEFA rule that top flight games can’t clash with Champions/Europa League games because of the issues that might have with splitting the audience (as if there is a massive overlap between City-PSG and Bravo-Radomlje, but whatever). As such, Bravo-Radomlje was an exception but I would personally add to Viler’s complaint at this point - games aren’t designed for ANY viewers.

Mura and Radomlje are the only clubs whose average attendance exceeds 25% of capacity this season and, even then, Radomlje’s capacity is 1200 - it’s not hard to exceed 25% of that! Olimpija, one of the two biggest clubs in the nation, average around 7%. It is difficult to build any sort of atmosphere at any game if fans aren’t there (beyond the obvious COVID reasoning) and if you are watching at home, the obvious question has to be asked as to why you should keep watching when the club’s own fans can’t even be bothered to turn up?

There are certain arguments I’d make here immediately to improve things - not least moving the areas for the ultras to right in the middle of the hard camera’s view given that, at both Stozice and Ljudski Vrt the ultras all sit behind goals, the one part of the ground the camera is pointed at least. That might sound like sacrilege to some but, if you want the ground to look busy, to look like people are actively interested in the product, then making sure that the camera is pointed at fans and not empty seats is a pretty obvious first step. Either way, clubs need to be better at getting fans through the door and promoting the fan experience. No-one is going to get hyped about a ground that is more library than an experience.

Football is prominent only at the big moments but isn’t part of the national conversation.

And this is the end point of all of this - a lack of engagement, a lack of atmosphere, a lack of cold hard cash. Unlike, say, Serbia which can maintain a national conversation on players playing outside of the nation (Mitro, Vlahovic, etc), Slovenia doesn’t have enough players at the tippy top level for that conversation to be maintained from the energy of that AND also lacks a league strong enough domestically (for all the reasons covered above) to maintain that conversation by itself. As a result, there is a visible lack of demand for the product in the stands which has transferred into an apathy in coverage of the product. Mura doing things in Europe helps that - them beating Spurs was amazing - but such things in isolation can’t spark the national conversation all by itself. It needs follow through and that has to come from the NZS, from the clubs and from the media who need to find hills to die on to create a conversation.

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thefootballlife · 3 years

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It’s about time… - VAR looks set for Scotland

Since the announcement from the SFA and SPFL that they would be actively looking to bring VAR into Scottish football, there have been ample takes about why it shouldn’t happen. Some of these have been from the killjoy perspective that the wait for VAR to clear a goal, etc… well, that it kills joy and that Scotland’s biggest marketing angle is that it’s good old fashioned meat and potatoes football, the sort that doesn’t come with the burdensome additions of extra camera angles or accurate decision making.

There’s plenty of those opinions around and the majority should come with a label attached about the author being a luddite. Scotland should have VAR and it’s really hard to see why anyone would argue against it.

Well, it’s not hard to see why people would argue against it, but it should be. Most of the issues with VAR aren’t with the concept of the thing, they are with poor implementations of it. VAR in the UK is indelibly marked with the failings of the first few months of the system in England where the FA’s interpretation of what VAR should be appeared to tend towards just re-refereeing the entire game which isn’t what it is anywhere else, nor is it what the system has eventually settled down to which is to say that it now takes the words “clear and obvious” seriously when it comes to rectifying clear and obvious refereeing errors. Any fears of VAR in 2021 are surely more around the concept that it’ll be botched when it’s actually implemented (which, fair enough, this is Scottish football we’re talking about) rather than the actual concept of VAR itself, which has shown itself to be of a net benefit to pretty much every league where it has been implemented.

Some of the issues are cost related - Craig Fowler in the Scotsman pointed out that the likely impact of adding cameras and technology to the grounds to make VAR work properly would amount to around £90k per club (or just under £1.1m to the league as a whole). This is no small amount of money but should be caveated with the fact that if these clubs were actually serious about how the league presents itself and broadcasts itself, then the cameras to provide the additional angles for referees and the technology to ensure those angles are then streamed to a VAR centre for decisions to be made should already be there, particularly after a season where every club just streamed every game live to season ticket holders over the internet - after all, what do those pesky customers actually expect? To be able to see the game properly instead of the camera thinking a linesman’s bald head is a ball?!

In short, the money they need to invest to make VAR work properly is money they should be investing and should have already invested anyway. It’s quite hard to say clubs shouldn’t spend the money on cameras and tech for VAR and then in the same sentence say that they should club together to help image and market the game when the former assists doing the latter any way.

There is also the mention that VAR will embroil us all in tedious debates about refereeing which is a startling comment as it somehow suggests that Scottish football isn’t already embroiled in tedious debates about refereeing on a weekly basis. The addition of VAR will simply be an added string to those tedious debates rather than a creator of a tedious debate in and of itself.

In fact, if one were to think of any location where the addition of VAR would help, a nation where half of fans think referees are Masonic bastards and the remainder just think they’re bastards would surely be pretty high on the list.

That there has been a major refereeing incident in the last round of league games in the Porteous red card has only firmed up opinions against it. VAR becomes framed as something that provides a division between “the rules” and “the game”. It is, of course, nothing of the like - six camera angles that are unclear will always be irrelevant compared to the one angle that clearly shows the offence and while a referee on the pitch only gets the benefit of one angle in real time, VAR has the leisure of multiple views and the chance to slow things down to make decision making clearer. The SFA doesn’t let referees face the press so anything towards making the decision making process clearer must surely be welcome. If we admit we have an issue with refereeing consistency, then VAR is the solution.

And, if nothing else, I’m reasonably certain that every Scottish fan takes issue with the consistency of refereeing in the SPFL.

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thefootballlife · 3 years

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On the state of professional wrestling

Were you to ask me twenty years ago, in the wake of the death of both ECW and WCW and 18 months into following an interest in wrestling that would last to today, if it was imaginable that WWE could be surpassed as the world’s foremost wrestling/sports entertainment company, I would have said no. I would have given the same answer for each of the intervening years.

Until now.

My own relationship with the WWE ended a little while ago - the last WWE event I took the time to actively watch was 2019’s Wrestlemania and, outwith catching a couple of individual matches since, I’ve primarily contented myself with just keeping up with what’s going on in storylines and highlights and that’s about it. But, in 2021, even that is becoming a bit of a hardship.

The simple answer as to why is simply that the product WWE is putting out is consistently not very good and the saving grace of providing actual good wrestling is also swiftly falling away also. That issue is accelerating because of over-exposure (an issue WWE has had for years) and also in comparison to other companies, specifically AEW.

Realistically, the issues WWE are suffering from are too long to list but identifying them is important to gauge why people are turning off tv and turning to Youtube, to social media or just turning off altogether.

The first is a combination of overexposure and structure. Since the original “brand split” between Raw and Smackdown, the shows have been broadly two entirely separate entities with varying levels of walls between the two - non-existent during the Supershow era a decade ago to pretty solid now. Come the WWE Network and the developmental territory NXT became a regular watch for many but still had its own set place in the food chain of WWE under both Raw and Smackdown. Come the advent of AEW, NXT was “promoted” into a 2 hour network show to counter AEW’s Dynamite and the walls around the show were put up.

The result is that WWE now produces three shows of weekly content on TV, all of which are meant to be broadly equal to each other and all of which are meant to be broadly separate to each other. With those three shows comprising seven hours, that’s an awful lot of time to expect people to watch but, aside from that, all three shows are meant to be broadly equal - what that has meant is that the hype around NXT callups that used to help drive Raw and Smackdown has gone because those NXT wrestlers who would come up to the “main” roster having been on a taped show helped to look good are now wrestlers who have been seen by everyone on TV a lot. The result has been that many of the NXT call-ups since the start of Dynamite have seen radical changes of character, most of which have completely failed to hit the mark, be that the woke-riot mockery of Retribution (that killed the careers of anyone who joined it) or the Zardoz cosplay of Karrion Kross. While the point of a developmental territory is that it is meant to not be entirely essential, that it was used to counter AEW (and got beaten in doing so) has not just made it inessential but also taken away what made it special in the first place and what gave it direct benefit to the other shows. As the world around us shows, you cannot just disrupt a wide ecosystem of processes and not see knock-on impacts elsewhere.

That disruption happened at the same time as one other major disruption to the WWE food chain - Smackdown moving to Fox. While the Fox move (along with other deals) secured WWE’s future as a company by giving them massive amounts of cash, the viewership available to WWE via Fox compared to the USA Network of Raw and NXT necessitated that Smackdown become the “A Show” - Seven of the nine major events (excl Royal Rumble) WWE have produced in 2021 have been headlined by a Smackdown match including both nights of Wrestlemania. In the two years since Smackdown joined Fox, Raw has been relegated to the B show, in spite of being an hour longer than Smackdown, and viewers have reacted as you’d expect - where Raw was pulling in around 2.2m viewers a week immediately prior to the pandemic and Smackdown around 2.5m, Smackdown now sits around 2.3m with Raw at 1.8m with the major demographics of Raw falling below those of AEW Dynamite on occasion. While Raw’s fall isn’t THAT precipitous, it’s still not exactly ideal given that that sort of rating puts them regularly in the territory of record lows.

But such lows are probably deserved given the feats of endurance and mental gymnastics that WWE is asking viewers to perform. While it has been known for a long time that doing a three hour TV show is much more difficult than doing a two hour TV show, it’s still very possible to put on a good three hour show. Unfortunately, WWE haven’t seemed capable of it. Raw is regularly just plain bad TV with some stuff that is outright embarrassingly bad. Perhaps most concerningly, a lot of the embarrassingly bad is in the ring be that in terms of performances in the ring just not being very good (Nia Jax…) or the booking of how the matches proceed leaving a bitter taste in the mouth (eg Finn Balor’s fall at the end of Extreme Rules).

To that latter point, WWE’s issues are two-fold - the first is the concept of 50-50 booking in so much that people are permitted to be dominant but only to an extent. This is designed to drag out certain feuds but the overall result tends to be that matches end inconclusively or via disqualification. In 2021, that runs at around two DQ/no contest ends to matches a week meaning that, realistically, there’s a two-thirds chance that you’ll watch a WWE show and there be some sort of non-finish. While the DQ and such booking can be an impactful weapon to propel a story onwards, it is reliant on being used sparingly rather than twice a week, every week. AEW in 2021 to date has had two.

Total.

The second issue is WWE’s insistence on spooky stuff. One can take Finn Balor for example - that match at Extreme Rules ended with him becoming his “Demon” character (who he channels for important moments) courtesy of the lights in the arena flashing red, his music coming on while he flopped to the beat like a demonic salmon before eventually getting up, staging a recovery while his music played, climbing to the top rope and the rope promptly breaking, sending him falling into the ring at which point his music immediately stopped, he was speared by Roman Reigns and lost.

It looked stupid in real life and, written down, it looks even stupider. In the Demon, WWE had a character they clearly didn’t want to diminish the aura of by him just straight up losing but, at the same time, they didn’t want Roman Reigns to lose a title. The obvious answer should have been to simply not book the match if it wasn’t possible to come up with a satisfactory ending that doesn’t make at least one of the competitors look like an idiot. Instead, Balor looked stupid and the aura behind the Demon is surely tarnished for good. Similar was the case with Bray Wyatt and his Fiend character, a seemingly unbeatable monster who, at various times, appeared from big jack in a boxes, was defeated infamously by a mallet and, well, you get the picture. Or the follow on character, Alexa Bliss who was taken into darkness by the fiend and apparently came out having been possessed by an ugly doll and using supernatural powers to do things like blow up lighting.

While there is nothing wrong with supernatural characters, there is if you don’t know how to see them lose matches and there is if they end up more or less taking over the entire show which having them there week in, week out as a focal point of everything naturally tends to. The Fiend can’t do demonic things like take John Cena to a shadow world one week and then the next week just have a normal match vs a midcard talent. So while such characters can see some great character work and cool moments, the ultimate long term plan of inserting such a character into a show is something that appears to regularly elude WWE’s writers/agents because they consistently fail to come up with satisfactory ways of concluding things involving such characters. Particularly when WWE have a tendency to change production values for these characters and do things like run matches with a red light on like the match is being viewed through a Virtual Boy.

Supernatural stuff can work (see: The Undertaker and Kane but, to be fair, the spooky stuff was very occasional with them) when done well but WWE aren’t doing it well. That is a long explanation of what is a short point - that fans are no longer given faith to believe that matches or storylines will be brought to a satisfactory conclusion and that the storylines are actually negatively impacting the ring work.

For, ultimately, we are at a point where we can actually say that, in the ring, WWE is definitely no longer the leader. Even at the high watermark of TNA be that during the Monday Night War Redux or, more appropriately, the mid-late 2000s, WWE did still always consistently put on an all round superior product from top to bottom when it came to putting wrestling matches on. They were overtaken by New Japan in the mid-2010s but, when comparing the viewer types, ease of watching and the style of wrestling, that wasn’t really a fair or direct comparison. However, AEW does definitely blow WWE out of the water when it comes to the action in the ring. AEW, in spite of far fewer hours of wrestling per week, has 9 matches rated 4 stars and above on fan rating app Grappl in 2021. WWE’s main roster has five and the developmental system that AEW trounced in the ratings war forcing a hard reset has four. Bluntly, AEW is a better wrestling show than WWE which, given what the second W in WWE stands for, should be quite embarrassing.

But perhaps more damaging for WWE within the circle of wrestling fans was its activity during the pandemic. Prior to the pandemic, through most of the late 2010s, WWE’s focus was on swatting aside the nascent indie scene be that by buying/linking up with UK independent Progress and setting up NXT UK to counter ITV’s revival of World of Sport (that was terrible) and they also went on a hiring spree on the basis that the best way to create new stars and to create hype was to bring in rough diamonds and polish the edges off. Since the pandemic began, the company has shed a considerable amount of these contracts, casting aside many established names who had found themselves surplus to requirements accepting the risk that that might risk losing some gems amongst them. Those gems were perhaps headlined by Brodie Lee, who AEW picked up ahead of him suffering from and eventually passing due to a respiratory condition - in spite of Brodie Lee’s impact directly tragically being cut short, his impact indirectly has been immense; led by the simply fantastic tribute show AEW completed for him after his death, a show that many high profile signings have quoted as having impacted their decision to join the company rather than remain with or rejoin WWE. Where WWE showed a some may say callous disregard for the welfare of their performers during a pandemic, AEW showed genuine affection and care in ensuring that one of their performers was remembered in a deeply personal and human manner (and while the acts aren’t directly comparable, it’s fair to note they engendered very opposite reactions from the wrestling community). Performers from across companies, led not least by the returning CM Punk have seen their futures as now belonging to a company seen to be acting in the right way rather than the way things had been done in the past.

The ensuing drain of talent from WWE to AEW has also drawn viewers across be it performers at the very top of the card in Bryan Danielson to developmental talents like Adam Cole to just plain frustrated people such as Miro and Malakai Black. The opening of the so-called “forbidden door” has also allowed AEW to bring in regular fresh talents and ensuring that special attractions don’t become stale. While, from a business perspective, WWE is in no danger given they have lucrative contracts with their broadcasters and the Saudi Arabia live shows, it is hard to contemplate a way in which alienating an audience that has been their core audience since day one is not going to come back to bite them at some point. While WWE will argue they are a content company not a wrestling one, and they certainly produce plenty of content, if the basis on which they were judged was solely around whether that content was consistently any good or not, then the picture would be considerably less rosy than what is reflected on shareholder reports as WWE consistently puts out a poorer product than their primary competitor (not that WWE would say AEW is a competitor) and while WWE’s contracts and funding can buy them surprises and moments, it can’t buy momentum and it’s impossible to deny that, between the two companies, the positive momentum firmly lies with AEW. No company should know that more than WWE from their battles 25 years ago with a WCW in the same position of having far more momentum than WWE did. Yet for all the predictions that WWE would appreciate having a fight on their hands against AEW, there has been precious little evidence that being in such a fight would provide a positive to the standard of show they put on. Arguably, since the launch of AEW’s Dynamite the general standard of WWE programming has decreased.

Ultimately, that is why it is imaginable that WWE could be surpassed because if any TV show isn’t putting on good television for an extended period, there is always the chance that those broadcasting that show demand change or lose patience. No-one is saying that that is imminent for WWE - as live programming is naturally at a premium and still makes people watch at the time of broadcast rather than cut the cord, ratings may have dropped significantly but they are still high compared to other things that could be put on in those timeslots - but when contract times come around, if WWE isn’t able to show growth because of these issues, then it will naturally have a big impact on their share price and confidence in the company as a whole, particularly if the company aren’t able to replace these budget streams or have expenditure that is reliant on increasing money from TV rights. Trouble isn’t imminent but it is easy to see a path laid out to it.

The introduction of AEW to the wrestling market has changed it forever and, arguably, coronavirus only served to delay the seismic changes that have occurred since their advent. They won’t, of course, remain on a hot streak forever and how they deal with the adversity of making poor creative decisions over an extended period (as we’ve seen in New Japan over the past 12 months courtesy of EVIL) will be the real litmus test of the staying power of AEW and more importantly, the sturdiness of the support they receive from fans given that it is something every company comes across from time to time.

But that one can even make an argument that AEW could feasibly challenge WWE is, for many fans, success in itself.

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thefootballlife · 3 years

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A guide to NS Mura for Spurs fans

Given it’s likely that most Spurs fans won’t have heard of NS Mura, I thought it best to give a detailed run through of the team Spurs are about to run into/through in the Conference League…

The Club - NS Mura were founded in 2012 and aren’t to be confused with ND Mura, their predecessor club founded in 2005 that died in 2012 or to be confused with NK Mura founded in 1924 that died in, you guessed it, 2005. They normally play out of the Fazanerija stadium in Murska Sobota (which is a great stadium) although, for reasons to do with UEFA’s minimum requirements, they’ll be holding home ties at Maribor’s Ljudski Vrt (which is only about 40 mins up the road). Their ultras group, the Crazy Gringos is also perhaps Slovenia’s most impactful fan group.

Last season, they defeated Maribor 3-1 in a top two clash on the final day of the season to win the club’s first ever national championship (in any iteration of the club!) with them winning their first Slovenian Cup the season prior. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to describe their current spell as the best period in the club’s history, whether you take that as starting in 2012 or 1924. This is their first appearance in any European group stage and they will surely be rueing their luck as having been thrown in against perhaps the best side in each of the three pots above them.

The Manager - Ante Simundza probably has a claim to be one of Slovenia’s greatest ever managers. No other manager has managed two separate European Group stage campaigns and, having picked Mura up in the lower leagues, taking them to the title last season was an incredible achievement. He is currently in his third spell at Mura - his first saw him take a side tipped for the drop into third, his second was more stewardship while ND Mura went into bankruptcy and this spell has seen him settle into a four-year spell of continuous growth.

The best way to describe him would be uncomplicated. Simundza sides are tight, competitive and tough to beat and he has plenty of good results in Europe on his CV be that CL group draws vs Chelsea and Sporting, beating Celtic in a CL playoff or drawing vs Sevilla in the Europa League last 32.

But it’s very fair to add that this Mura side are a weaker side than his Maribor one of the mid-2010s that were able to pull those results off.

The players - Mura are a likeable group be it keeper Matko Obradovic, who insists on wearing the number 69 (…nice), or Ziga Kous, whose reaction to winning the Slovenian title was to give an interview on TV stating he’d be out partying for the next two days (and kept his word!).

On the pitch, while no Simundza side is ever an action packed fun ride, players like Luka Bobicanec and Mitja Lotric are some of the best attacking midfielders the Slovenian league has to offer and the money from this European run has been invested into bringing last season’s top scorer in the league Nardin Malahusejnovic into the group along with other proven domestic talents such as the aforementioned Lotric and Ziga Skoflek. Bobicanec, Lotric, Horvat and Klepac can, and will, shoot on sight with sometimes absolutely spectacular results (albeit, Bobicanec will very likely be missing due to injury).

The Tactics - Mura aren’t necessarily the easiest side to get a gauge on in terms of how they’ll set up given that they have brought quite a few players in this summer. Most of last season saw them in a fairly standard 4-2-3-1 but this season has seen them alternate a lot more between 4-2-3-1 and 3-4-1-2.

Neither of these are a massively comfortable fit given the personnel Mura have and how they’ve chosen to go about their business this summer (which, in my own opinion, has left them quite imbalanced with lots of good players who like playing off the striker but no-one there for them to play off).

If one looks at the Vitesse game, Mura started with Kozar and Horvat deeper in the 4-2-3-1, which isn’t necessarily the best role for Horvat (who is naturally a more attacking player), and Klepac as a lone striker, which definitely isn’t his best role (because he’s a winger and his scoring record isn’t great - last season, only Bobicanec took more shots per 90 than Klepac in the league. Klepac scored once last season - albeit it was the goal that won the title). When going three at the back, the tendency is to push Kous and Sturm (FBs) into midfield areas with Klepac as a free role just sort of running about the place up front annoying people. I would expect Mura to set up with a three vs Spurs which they’ve used in victories vs Olimpija and Maribor recently but their 3-4-1-2 will look a bit more like a 3-3-3-1.

Mura’s key issue vs Vitesse was the lack of an outball for much of the game and getting the ball to stick up front and should they proceed as vs Vitesse with Klepac as a lone nuisance buzzing around, a repeat of that problem is likely - selection of the taller Nardin Malahusejnovic or Kai Cipot may be the way they go.

But, to be fair, all of this is pretty immaterial because…

The Outcome - The total market value of the entire Slovenian Prva Liga as per Transfermarkt is just under £47m. Tottenham’s value is worth around 13 times that. While English sides do famously have a tendency to take it a little bit easy in European competitions that don’t start with the word “Champions”, it’s fair to say that Mura lack a player who would even get on Spurs’ bench, never mind in the actual team. Were Mura to turn Spurs over in London, it would rightly go down as one of Spurs’ most embarrassing moments in their history (or, at least, since the first 45 minutes vs Arsenal this past weekend). Arguably, Mura’s greatest hope would be that Spurs rehire the chef from Lasagna-gate and poison the entire side in the hours leading up to the game.

But this is football and football can be weird. Simundza has gotten surprising results in Europe before when at Maribor and when Mura have clicked in Europe, their record has been pretty good, as seen when thrashing Shkendija in CL qualifying. Even vs Vitesse, where Mura were outclassed, they managed one big chance in the first half and had positive spells early in the second that could have changed the outlook of that game had they taken them. Spurs have the talent to blow Mura away, but Mura have the resolve to keep it competitive for periods - even if one were to go back to their 5-1 loss to PSV in the EL last season, perhaps their only game against a side of comparable quality to Spurs, PSV were made to work for that, particularly in the first half where Mura were more than competitive.

So, for Mura to have a chance they must score first and they must not be afraid to shoot - against Vitesse, the crossing game didn’t work and, with time in Spurs’ final third likely to be at a premium asking the likes of Klepac and Lotric to shoot on sight (and have someone following in for any nice rebounds) is going to be one of the only ways to get shots off in any volume - they do have the individual ability to test Spurs from longer range areas so, barring any glaring errors that grant Mura opportunity to get the ball into the box, it’s likely that much of their threat will come from individual efforts catching Spurs out.

Last time a Slovenian side met an English one in a European group, Liverpool hammered Maribor 7-0 in Slovenia. Mura don’t necessarily have the glaring vulnerabilities that that Maribor side had but, were Spurs to win by a similar amount, it would be only a minor surprise. That isn’t a reflection on how Mura will play, but it is an acceptance of the absolute gulf in resources the two clubs have. Had Vitesse had their shooting boots on, they could have and probably should have won by more than two - Mura weren’t disgraced but they weren’t particularly competitive either. Mura will test Spurs for periods, Mura do have a way they can threaten (agricultural though the concept of simply shooting as soon as you’re 25 yards out may be), but the chances of Mura actually getting a result in London are somewhere between little and none.

For Mura to have reached the Conference League group stage is an achievement in itself and, arguably, an endorsement of the aims of the competition to get more nations into group stages of European competitions. That their players are being exposed to this higher level of competition will be a valuable experience for many, in particular the young homegrown talents of the Cipot brothers and also the journeymen talents who have become associated with the club like Kous and Karnicnik. The funding that this run is bringing in will make the club more secure and more able to try to retain their title. Simply being here in the first place is massive for both the club and for Slovenian football and though they may be minnows fighting giants, they will hope that their arms are long enough to bloody a nose or two.

They will certainly not go without trying.

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thefootballlife · 3 years

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Beeched Boys - Carlisle United’s sloppy start reflects on a club in stasis

Which makes what is happening at Carlisle United all the more surprising as the club’s continued downsizing and lack of ambition threatens the club with the ultimate punishment - relegation out of the EFL and, after around… well… after a lot of years, demotion to becoming Cumbria’s second club behind Barrow. After a season without fans which, for a time, promised promotion, how have standards slipped so far?

First things first, it would be scaremongering to suggest that Carlisle are in imminent danger of dropping out of the Football League this season. Quite aside from anything, Oldham are rightly pencilled in for bottom place given their massive off the field issues and, given the past 18 months of everything, it’s also quite difficult to suggest that other clubs won’t, at some point, find themselves at some sort of financial impasse between here and May. Carlisle, to the owners’ credit, won’t be one of those clubs finding themselves out of cash given that Carlisle’s long-run business plan of, well, penny-pinching have left the club better capable of absorbing a shock than many others. A wage/revenue ratio of only 54% in 19/20 places the club as perhaps the most sensible in the entire division in terms of where the money goes (albeit, given that season also included the Branthwaite sale to Everton, the true figure is probably a bit higher).

But that’s about the only thing the owners of the club will be getting credit for in this piece.

The latest result was a 2-2 home draw against second bottom Scunthorpe who, for the first 45 minutes, proceeded to run roughshod over a listless Carlisle side and go in 2-0 up thanks to a pair of goals from corners - the first from issues in the second and third phase, the second from, well, just not tracking the run of a big 6ft 2in defender and giving him a free header five yards out. They were quite the defensive sins.

Go back a week to the loss vs Crawley and, once more, the opening goal came from slack defending at a corner with Crawley’s winner (to be fair, a great volley) coming after more issues clearing the ball from a cross. In defeat against Hartlepool? The winner, again a great volley, came straight from a failure to fully clear a long throw. Vs Orient? A poor clearance from a long ball leading directly to a goal.

It may sound obvious, but any side in League Two that repeatedly has an issue dealing with aerial balls into the box is going to be a side that has issues in League Two particularly when the issues aren’t just across one element of defending set pieces, but across both marking the initial set piece and then also getting out and pressing as things move into the second phase and beyond. Breaking this into a broader set piece analysis across the league, Carlisle fit into the quadrant where they concede less xG from open play than the average but more xG from set pieces than average. Creatively, their set piece xG creation has also halved based on last season’s stats. No side in the league has conceded more from set pieces, no side has conceded more xG from set pieces and this plays out in general aerial duels also - a success rate so far this season around 10% lower than last season.

(Most of those stats are from the Fox Analytics account on twitter. Give it a follow.)

What all that means is that Carlisle are actually an effective defensive side with a glaring weakness at set plays where they appear to lack organisation (as the Scunthorpe game showed) and the ability to deal as effectively with aerial bombardment compared to last season.

In both instances, you would look at transfer decisions made by the club that were, in likelihood, reasonably obvious calls but calls that have damaged the side - namely the sales of both George Tanner and Aaron Hayden to Bristol City and Wrexham respectively added to the loss of Rhys Bennett to Gillingham. Both deals were likely decent money (for both club and player) but selling a large portion of the defence and only bringing in one loan signing in the centre by way of replacement is obviously going to end up with things looked rather disjointed at the back, especially when that loanee (Dinzeyi from Arsenal) hasn’t played a single proper game of senior football (with all due disrespect to the U23 sides in the EFL Trophy) nor has he yet appeared for United.

Now, while it goes without saying that attracting sides to the geographical outpost of Carlisle is slightly more difficult than it is for almost every other League Two side but selling your central defence after the season has started and not replacing it is asking for trouble given it removes a level of tactical flexibility from the manager’s potential options. While Carlisle do have some depth in the rest of the side, they are playing four at the back every game out of necessity and shuffling the pack in front. What that has resulted in is some Jekyll and Hyde performances - Scunthorpe being one but the victory vs Salford being another - where Carlisle are spending extended periods under the cosh because Plan A hasn’t worked and Carlisle have had to get to Plan C because they don’t have the depth to have a Plan B.

And that’s a board issue given that no football manager has ever yet found themselves able to tie their own hands behind their back.

As things stand, the club have been up for sale for, well, pushing on a decade with the ownership actively looking to get out ASAP for at least three. In short, the club were previously funded by EWM who went bust a little while ago and Carlisle are caught in the crossfire of the administrative proceedings behind that so that, while the club is “well run” in regards to it not being a hideously unprofitable mess (unlike, say, Swindon were), it is in a debt over £2m courtesy of those previous arrangements and the longer the club goes without a permanent solution to its ownership question, the more money the club takes in that will end up being diverted to service that debt. The club needs a buyer to take it forward and service the debt but the debt needs servicing before there’ll be a buyer.

And while fans aren’t raucous and attendances are steady, roughly comparable to 2019/20 before everything, they are settling in for what looks like a season that is the inevitable result of late sales and reshaping of the side in the death throes of the summer window. Given Carlisle have saleable talents as well, what does that augur for January? One can’t sell the family silver, replace it with tin and hope no-one notices forever.

For now, it’s fixable. Sorting set pieces out defensively will fix many results making Carlisle a defensively solid if blunt force. It may make eyes bleed but it will, at least, prevent the points total from doing similar.

It’s difficult not to think that if the club were offered their current league position of 14th at the end of the season that they wouldn’t take it eagerly. But if that is the club’s ambition and the club’s mid to long term ambition at that, missing that spot even a little bit will inevitably result in serious trouble.

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thefootballlife · 3 years

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Killing the Territory - Maribor and Olimpija’s failings hurt the league as a whole

At Stozice, even the Eternal derby itself pulled in under 3,500 fans - an attendance that compares unfavourably with some of Mura’s European games, hosted at a Fazanerija three times smaller that the national stadium and a number that is around half the number that attended Stozice in the previous derby vs Maribor with fans in September 2019.

Even when you take into account the limited increase in barriers to attending games (that you need a negative test, so nothing massively onerous), this is a precipitous decline in interest in the big clubs of Slovenia. Even Mura’s domestic attendances have fallen this season so far, perhaps the most robust in the league, albeit that can be partially attributed to games being shifted to Sunday evenings because of their European commitments and that the Radomlje game took place in a monsoon.

While Slovenia’s eventful title races have had an impact in terms of neutral interest in the league, the reality is that the malaise at the top end of the league that has caused this has sapped the resolve of the fans of the biggest clubs. More people care a little bit about the outcome of the Slovenian league because of two consecutive seasons of shock winners being crowned in massively dramatic circumstances but fewer people are consumed with passion by it because of what is beginning to become consistent underperformance from both traditional giants of the game in Maribor and Olimpija.

To begin with Olimpija, as is reasonably commonly said any time I talk about them, Olimpija gonna Olimpija. They are dysfunctional and they are disconnected from their fans and, perhaps, outright disconnected from logic and reality itself. This season so far has been tumultuous after their pre-season was derailed by allegations that resulted in Ziga Frelih, Radivoj Bosic and Mihailo Perovic all released from the club. Their form has been unpredictable at best with such positives as a 3-1 win over Maribor followed by a 3-1 loss to Koper and 2-0 loss to city rivals Bravo. They have spent big in bringing Almedin Ziljkic to the club, who does at least look a very good player. Against reigning champions Mura at the weekend, Olimpija lost only 1-0 but were under the cosh for most of the game getting caught both high and narrow regularly even before Timi Max Elsnik was sent off for a high, studs up challenge that would have been a sending off in any league at any point in time. Mura are one thing, a naturally awkward team whose entire attacking format is based around counterattacking and dropping between lines, but the 2-0 defeat to Bravo was perhaps the most worrying for Savo Milosevic. Quite aside from any concept of local bragging rights, Olimpija were mightily poor.

Maribor’s issues are, well, the same as they have been for about two years - easy to counter on and unimaginative in attack. Their 3-0 loss to Aluminij this weekend was perhaps the most embarrassing result the club have suffered in some time - Aluminij were bottom but, more than that, had scored only twice in their opening seven league games of the season before taking Maribor to the woodshed. Simon Rozman has come under serious pressure as a result and it’s easy to see why - outside of their opening day win over Celje, a team still developing, there isn’t a result Rozman could point to as an outright positive. Even their latest win, against Tabor Sezana four games ago, can barely count in that column given the Cherries have since upgraded manager and that Tabor Sezana’s away form is almost a trope in how reliably poor it is.

Rozman and Sporting Director Marko Suler have been reasonably ambitious in getting players out of the club yet it’s hard to make any sort of case that the side is actually any stronger. The likes of Cretu and Matko as options that would have started last season that have moved on haven’t been replaced and while much of the releases over the spring and summer were of depth options, that doesn’t mean they’ve necessarily been adequately replaced. Maribor are almost unrecognisable compared to twelve months ago as even those they’ve brought in are, in many cases, obscure. Only Danijel Sturm, brought in from second tier Bilje, could go down as a player who is meeting/exceeding the expectations he will have had when brought in. The rest just sort of doesn’t seem to work. With Suler and Rozman, Maribor have tried to enact a revolution to revitalise what was very much a flagging club in recent years at the close of the Zahovic era. Instead, they’ve found that there was some way further to go for them to drop before they can bounce back.

Both are a reasonable explanation of a drop in interest/passion from their support. Olimpija fans aren’t exactly Mandaric fans because over his tenure at the club, they have regularly been a mess on and off the field. Like any side where fans have legitimate issues with the owners (and, unlike, say, Newcastle, where demand doesn’t outstrip supply), ticket sales drop as people choose to stay home rather than spend their money on disappointing Dragons green with envy at the success of smaller clubs. For Maribor, it isn’t a surprise that people turned away from the club as the smouldering embers of the Zahovic era began to go out permanently because the club was providing a low standard of entertainment and, since the Zahovic era ended, the club has provided a lower standard of playing staff to go along with it. The club’s golden age is gone and while Rozman’s remit was to remove all remnants of it, all that has happened is that the differences between then and now have been made more stark.

Which leaves Slovenian football in a bit of a quandary. For one, there are other sports muscling in - who could really blame anyone changing their attention towards Slovenia’s very real world class superstars in Pogacar, Roglic and Doncic, all of whom have reached new heights while fans weren’t able to go to football games. Slovenia, arguably, is the only nation whose football has faced a perfect storm of having superstars come through during COVID while football’s empires ended at the same time. There has been less a changing of the guard within football and more a vacuum into which other sports have encroached.

This is not to belittle the likes of title winners Celje or title winners Mura or currently six points clear Koper but they have not been able, as yet, to capitalise or maintain the consistency to make Slovenia’s big two a big three or more. That takes time and sustained excellence - Mura might, with their European exploits, get to that point domestically but, when combined with the low winning points totals of the past couple of years, it is easy to entertain the suggestion that Slovenia’s habit of excellent title races has been a byproduct of a fall in quality at the top sides rather than necessarily a great leap forward from anyone else. European failures such as both Maribor and Olimpija being outclassed in the Conference League qualifiers by Hammarby and Santa Clara respectively add further credence to that theory.

While competition in the Prva Liga is arguably the strongest it has ever been and the overall standard of play in the division has not decreased, the difference between the top end and the bottom has shrunk and that has been almost entirely caused by a drop in quality at the top rather than a severe uptick of the smaller sides. That, eventually, will begin to impact on UEFA coefficients, particularly as the following two seasons will see Slovenia’s larger coefficient season totals drop out of the equation and run the risk of a fall to 35th in the table (which would mean every team starts in 1QR of the ECL when Slovenia should be eyeing a rise to 28th in the table which means everyone starts in 2QR).

But clubs need bums in seats to help sustain investment otherwise the money coming into the league will almost solely be from Europe. Celje have been able to use last season’s CL money to fund their squad and, finally, this weekend vs Domzale it looked like money well spent - they travel away to Olimpija and then Maribor as their next league games and that will go a long way towards firming up their credentials. Mura have a bit of money and the late pick-up of last season’s league top scorer Nardin Malahusejnovic once European group football was confirmed was a good bit of business. For both Maribor and Olimpija, it must be galling to see the path to greatness seem more simple for provincial clubs compared to the paths they must face.

Slovenia has a great competition. The Prva Liga is arguably the most reliable title race in Europe when it comes to delivering drama. But, in the long run, it needs an internal food chain to drag fans back through the gates. After all, should Koper go on to win the title this season, it will be a shock but it will be less of a shock than Mura which, in turn, was less of a shock than Celje because the consistent failings of Maribor and Olimpija have made those odds that bit easier to overcome.

Both Vecni Derbi giants are at a crossroads with fans staying at home. Both have slipped because of their own failings and both seem not to know how to right their course.

For Slovenian football’s sake, they need to.

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