Lots of talk from the new guy about 'attacking football' and the resonance with Sandgaard's favoured 'high block', so it might be fun to speculate on what we might look forward to in the coming season.
No-one would dispute the attraction of playing football on the front foot and, for those of you with long memories, I have hinted that Garner may be the new Andy Nelson ... manager in the Hales and Flanagan era when most games seemed to finish 4-2.
So, what will Garner's football be like? And how will it compare to Nelson's team?
The high press requires very energetic players. And co-ordination. Make no mistake, this is a high-risk strategy that requires co-ordinated team movement. Get it wrong, have a weak link, and you are in trouble. Get it right, and you win the ball back close to the opposition goal ... and this will happen a lot in League 1. So, we will make a host of chances. And we will need a Hales and Flanagan to put them away.
No point in making the chances if you go on to miss them, so our main strikers need to be very good. They will be top of Garner's shopping list. Get that right and we are looking at a 20 goals and 15 goals plus return.
The wide players need to be energetic and able to deliver good crosses. This is crucial. Hitting the byline regularly would be a very good idea. Haven't seen much of that in recent seasons.
Midfield? Again, boundless energy but, curiously, there are less demands on them than there are with the forwards and wide players. Being able to slip a forward in once the ball is regained is high on the list but, unlikely many other styles of play, you do not need your central midfielders to be the 'main men'. Don't get me wrong, though. They still need to be good players technically, but the main attributes are energy, speed of thought etc.
Defenders also need to be agile, intelligent and comfortable on the ball. Speed is also important because ...
... well ... because there are disadvantages with this high-press style of play.
We will be susceptible to the counter-attack when our high-press breaks down. We will concede goals that make us look like amateurs. We will shake our heads and ask ... WTF?
However, if we get the recruitment right, the good moments should outweigh the bad.
Remember ... 4-2. I'll settle for that.
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Comments
Yeah.
Would expect our high quality attacking signings to be for the wide roles.
“STOP DICKING AROUND. F***ING GET IT FORWARDS”
Can we build not just a decent starting 11, but a decent squad over the summer and get it right, I don’t know it’s a big ask, but hopefully an exciting season ahead.
I know people wil go back to the 2011/12 season and say it’s been done before , but was that of its time and a one off, Ipswich tried and failed, Wigan tried and and succeeded.
The comments above about is probably conceding silly goals is probable, I want to see us have a very consistent good quality midfield, tracking and pressing and dominating play, with an end product.
Our goals tally from midfield has been shockingly low, we deserved to finish where we did, I really hope we can do better, and I don’t think Elliott Lee did enough and hope we don’t sign him.
Watson, Arter the list goes, were just not good enough.
Get the midfield recruitment right, and we have a chance of moving up the table.
Although we also need to bring in players in other areas as well , otherwise it’s just pie in the sky, and nice words, that make you sound like you know what you’re talking about (talking about Ts).
It may or may not work although our U23s, U18s and U16s already play in something like this style so their progression will be smoother as and when they are given a chance.
And while we won't have players of the quality of City or Liverpool neither will our league one opponents.
Taking chances is vital regardless of the style you play but if you create more chances, as Garner's side did last season, that increases your chances of scoring.
We were weak defensively last season not playing this new way so nothing new there.
So we need new defenders for any formation given we have one centre back, Lavelle. The others are young Deji and crocked Ryan.
So, as Gallen has already said, we need ball playing CBs but the identity means the recruiters know that and are looking for that. That in itself is a huge leap forward in my eyes.
We need to get the recruitment right but at least there is a clear job spec.
Will this new style mean that long ball, physical teams like Accrington will be able to bully us again? Yes, it may well but we matched a not dissimilar Rotherham.
The key will be, IMHO, can we break down those sides that sit deep (aka the low block) and impose our style of play on them, something we struggled with last year.
All tactical systems have weaknesses and can all be beaten.
That includes the system we'll play and those of our opponents. That is the beauty of football.
At the same time individual players need to do their jobs consistently and well (classic example: jump when defending a corner in the last minute at Millwall). Don't do that and all the tactics or skills are but nothing.
Curbs was asked what advice he was given by more experienced managers when he first started out.
The advice was stark, crude and some would say reductive but it applies to Garner and every other gaffer
"Just win some f****** games"
I just wonder if Ben Garner realizes the task ahead if he wants to turn Charlton into a high press team ?
Press, Possession, Performance: that was Johan Cruyff's mantra at Barcelona when he took over and played a 4-3-3 which changed to 3-4-3 but was so flexible when watching you could hardly tell. It was never rigid because just like Pep Guardiola who played in that side that won La Liga's in 4 seasons on the bounce, it was about playing it from the back with Angles so no formation can be rigid and you play through the lines with fit technical players on the ball; see why @ShootersHillGuru and myself feel this could take time !
What Cruyff achieved, we will need to do in the mediocre League 1 and Ronald Koeman picked up the ball from the keeper mainly and the options he had were plenty because of Geometry BUT he also had the ability to hit good long diagonal passes to either of the wider forwards in the front 3. Cafc will need to mix and match as no way will Charlton players not make errors in League 1 as otherwise they wouldn't be in the 3rd tier.
One of the things I found depressing last season was the number of times supposedly "inferior" sides ran rings around us with simple passing triangles and good movement off the ball.
It would be nice to see our team doing that for a change.
It seems to me we barely have a handful of players suited to Garner's brave new world.
Even some of our better players, and I would include Stockley and Lavelle in that, have a retro dinosaur vibe about them.
Good luck Ben. I am both excited and sceptical.
But I think you might need to get some early wins on board however much of a "work in progress" your project is.
I fear the Valley faithful are jaded, damaged and impatient.
We need to recognise this and see that it won't happen instantly and will take a bit of time for methods to be embedded. There are some decent starting points here, but an awful lot of work to be done. Realistically, for this team and squad to be successful, this is what I think needs replacing from last year:
GK: McG is a decent keeper, but he's not great with the ball at his feet and I am not sure he suits BG's style of play. AMB could be ready made replacement though.
Rb/Rwb x 2: We don't have one
Lb/Lwb x 2: We don't have one (If Purrington's rumours are true)
CB: We have Lavelle who I think will be integral going forward and our new captain, Inniss (who I can't see us being able to rely on) and two promising youngsters in Ness and Deji. At the very least we need 1 decent ball playing LCB.
CM: Must get an energetic box to box midfielder. And I am really not sure Morgan or Gilbey are good enough for it. Aaron Henry may be good enough to be Dobson's back up but I haven't seen enough to know for sure.
LWF/RWF: CBT and DJ probably could fit these roles well, but definitely more assistance is needed.
CF: Stockley may be our focal point, but I would worry about his pace and energy to play the high press, doesn't seem his natural game. Either way we need a cover because if he is crocked, Davison is NOT the answer.
I think Clare provides cover for lots of those roles and his energy will suit a high press, but I just don't know where his best position is.
I make that 10 players required which I don't think is realistic this summer, which is why I am confident of improvement but I think promotion may be a step to far for us this year. Gallen would have to pull an absolute blinder out of the bag if we achieved it.
I think the future is bright and quietly exciting though.
This is why I worry when I hear 'style of play'. Much better to say 'preferred style of play'.
Without flexibility and adaptable players, you soon find your ceiling.
It's also quite amusing to imagine that the opposition don't play some part in all this too. Like they will all roll over and let you play your way.
Some good thoughts on this thread, though, and I hope it will allow sensible judgement of newly-recruited players against this backdrop of what we think might be required.
Whilst aesthetic beauty and fancy descriptors are all very well, three points every game is the absolute priority.