[Football] De Zerbi ball is a bit like Gus ball - discuss

[Albion in the north]

We were playing good football for the relative league we were in.

 

[WATFORD zero]

You mean 'We're f***in' brilliant'?

I don't know about you, but when we sang it at Withdean, I sang it with a smile, If we sing it now I'm deadly serious

 

[Icy Gull]

No, Gus shat himself when we played top teams and we seldom got anywhere near the penalty area as we passed the ball sideways and backwards. De Zerbi couldn’t be more different to Poyet when we play top teams. Other than that yes.

I agree with @Commander about how it will end though, it will be messy.

 

[Cowfold Seagull]

For me they are fundamentally different.

The last season at Withdean felt quite attacking and go getting but you have to remember we had Wood, Murray and Barnes, all future Premier League strikers. The later Amex version was more conventional tiki taka. Sure it was possession football but partly based on the reasoning that having the ball is a part of a defensive strategy and partly that shifting from side to side was more to gradually pull a team out of position than to draw a press and fly through it at top speed. You also couldn't have defenders in the box for a goal kick so the start off ploy never involved a pivot.

When teams did press Gus well - notably West Ham at home - we were normally soundly beaten.

Finally he always relied on a holding midfielder to keep the shape and win back the ball and then use it cleverly - first Kishishev and then Bridcutt. RDZ doesn't really use a standard CDM.

As for emotionally - well they're both Latin, full of charisma and likely to stand outside their technical area and they both love the game. After that, chalk and cheese. De Zerbi is a true gentleman and appears to have very strong morals and a high work ethic to go with his big balls. I wouldn't trust Gus to look after a child's toy without trying to flog it.

Sorry, that bit about Gus trying to flog a kid's toy made me giggle. I have to say though, that l have met Gus on a couple of occasions, once before a game at Withdean, and again for a slightly longer period of time when he bought a young Albion side to play Horsham YMCA in a pre-season friendly.

On both occasions he came across as politemess personified. Of course he would have been in official meet and greet mode, but l've a feeling that away from the game, he is probably more laid back, and facinating company.

 

[Weststander]

EFA

 

[WATFORD zero]

Sorry, that bit about Gus trying to flog a kid's toy made me giggle. I have to say though, that l have met Gus on a couple of occasions, once before a game at Withdean, and again for a slightly longer period of time when he bought a young Albion side to play Horsham YMCA in a pre-season friendly.

On both occasions he came across as politemess personified. Of course he would have been in official meet and greet mode, but l've a feeling that away from the game, he is probably more laid back, and facinating company.

I know loads of people who are great company and I would go for dinner with them whenever the opportunity arose, but I wouldn't go into business with them in a million years

 

[Easy 10]

You wouldn't trust Gus with your missus, would you.

 

[The Wizard]

Only comparison I see is both involve a round thing called a ball, very different tempo and overall style.

 

[Super Steve Earle]

I get what the OP is saying. L1 Gus playing a style of football totally different to anything we had seen before from Albion or anybody in the lower Leagues. In that first season, I believed Gus could walk on water and how we revelled in the football, the results and our charismatic manager. In all those regards, RDZ has had the same impact.

 

[Jimmy Grimble]

Both managers like their team to have the ball.

What they get their players to do with the ball, the patterns of play, the structures throughout the side and the speed of play is very, very different.

 

[Nobby Cybergoat]

You wouldn't trust Gus with your missus, would you.

And I certainly wouldn't trust my Mrs with De Zerbi

 

[Easy 10]

And I certainly wouldn't trust my Mrs with De Zerbi

Gus would be up there like a rat up a drainpipe.

Whereas De Zerbi would be like "hmmm...you are very....hmmm...bellissimo, no ? But I errrmmm...I must...I have a mmmm....I am meeting a Solly for, mmm...I must be the leaving at the moment..."

 

[1066familyman]

Yes this.

Gus’s style was pretty standard Tika Taka which was all the rage at the time with Spain and Barca dominating. It worked so well for us as no else had dared try it before in the lower English leagues and the stars aligned for us for that style of play with the players we had and subsequently signed.

RDZ’s football is far more advanced from that.

Gus was great though, will always be a favourite of mine despite the ending and constant skirt lifting towards Leeds.

I loved Gus. The way he transformed players at that level of football was just beautiful to watch. Adam El Abd springs immediately to mind. A warrior for us, just like Andy Whing, and to see him then playing out from the back was like watching a ferocious caterpillar become that beautiful butterfly.

Absolutely marvellous scenes!

 

[Sepulveda]

DeZerbiBall is many things, but counter-attacking is not one of them in my view.

Sometimes it kind of is something similar, in the sense that at its quickest it lives off transitions when the opposing team is unbalanced pressing in your area. Many describe it as "counterattacking without ever losing possession first". Then obviously you have variations and you can play different, more standard possession-based football when attacking teams that sit deeper like Brentford or Tottenham. You always try to find quick transitions into space though, if possible.

 

[Justice]

Completely different, Poyet’s philosophy was if the other team don’t have the ball they can’t score. This lead to endless passing for the sake of passing around the back and back and forth from defence to midfield.
If Poyet had had some balls that last squad of his should have gone up automatically no question.

It made players like Bridcutt look better than they were as they were constantly on the ball making ineffective passes.
RDZ’s philosophy is to score as many goals as possible hence our huge stats at attempts on goal.

 

[Albion in the north]

It was great fun watching us under Gus (until it wasnt) but De Zerbi ball is something else. Theres always a reason for doing something. Most teams in the Prem dont have that never mind further down the pyramid. Most other Prem teams are good players trying to make something happen, whereas we are a good team working together to make something happen.

 

[Machiavelli]

Sometimes it kind of is something similar, in the sense that at its quickest it lives off transitions when the opposing team is unbalanced pressing in your area. Many describe it as "counterattacking without ever losing possession first". Then obviously you have variations and you can play different, more standard possession-based football when attacking teams that sit deeper like Brentford or Tottenham. You always try to find quick transitions into space though, if possible.

Yes, I'd go along with that. I suppose when I think of counter-attacking football, Mourinho might be the arch-exponent, where you sit deep and invite pressure on to you, somehow steal the ball and then break rapidly with a few extremely quick forwards.
As you say, with RdZ, the strategy is to invite the press deep, usually in our own penalty area, and then transition quickly ideally using what one analyst referred to as the 'De Zerbi promised land'.

 

[Hugo Rune]

RDZ ball is much faster. We play it out from the back completely differently to how we did under Gus, and we attack much quicker.

Definitely similarities between the managers though, RDZ is great when things are going well, but I fully expect it to end in tears with him, like it did with Gus.

This.

I remember so many draws with Gus in the Championship era. There was the same belief about possession with Gus, it seemed like possession for possessions sake. It worked in League One but not so much in the Championship where Hughton had much more effective tactics.

In short, RDZ is braver and seems to have more effective and much faster attacking tactics.

 

[Frankie]

What is quite funny is how other teams are starting to try and play the way we do and the Leeds version is absolutely hilarious to watch,if they continue to try to play out the way we do for the rest of this season they will go down as it looks like their defenders have not quite got to grips with it yet infact I'd suggest they really haven't got a clue

 

[Commander]

And I certainly wouldn't trust my Mrs with De Zerbi

I'd be worried my Mrs wasn't good enough for De Zerbi.