[Albion] Hürzeler’s (Brighton) Tactics

[Mo Gosfield]

It was working really well for twenty minutes. We were pressing them and not giving them the time to calibrate passes through the offside trap. Even when Palmer hit the post, it would have been called off for offside.

The loss had a lot more to do with giving the ball away in super dangerous positions rather than Chelsea abusing our high line.

"Can't play like this if we don't have faster CBs boohoo".. well, where are we finding the CB that catches up with Jackson when he gets a through ball from Webster?

The first goal was a situation where Webster puts them in a 2v1 where they're going to score four out of five times.
The second goal is an unnecessary (and honestly rather cheap) penalty were giving to them.
The third goal is an insane free kick from 200 meters and there's no defending against that one. But again the free kick wasn't a result of high defending, it was a result of giving the ball away very cheaply and then fouling the player.
The fourth goal is a result of Bart giving the ball away.

None of the goals are a consequence of the high back line. There's really extraordinarly little that indicates we'd have fared better if we had given Chelsea more time, ball and space on our half of the pitch.

Neither quicker defenders or lower defence line is going to prevent us from losing when repeatedly giving the ball to the opponent in super dangerous positions.

I said to friends at the game yesterday that we cannot keep giving the ball away in dangerous areas. We make too many errors for a side with top ten aspirations. A lot of it is down to overthinking and overplaying. The very best sides keep it quick and simple and accurate. Not fancy spins and flicks 30 - 40 yards from your own goal. First touch is vital. Mitoma is superb. Minteh is a brick wall.
We need to tighten up and keep it simpler.

 

[Not Andy Naylor]

If (and it's a big if) everyone plays their part to perfection, which involves pressing the opposition before they can pass through our lines, then the present defensive system has a chance against some teams. Chelsea, though, were the last team to try it against, although Tottenham next week may run them close. And we were so easily undone on Saturday by some basic first-time no-look hoofs over our defence that even near perfection in our press wouldn't have made much difference.

But, in Webster's defence, Ferdi didn't help him at all for their first goal by passing to him with Jackson already running at him.

 

[Terry Butcher Tribute Act]

Upon reflection, the word 'Brighton' in the subject line should be replaced with 'insane'

 

[dwayne]

It was working really well for twenty minutes. We were pressing them and not giving them the time to calibrate passes through the offside trap. Even when Palmer hit the post, it would have been called off for offside.

The loss had a lot more to do with giving the ball away in super dangerous positions rather than Chelsea abusing our high line.

"Can't play like this if we don't have faster CBs boohoo".. well, where are we finding the CB that catches up with Jackson when he gets a through ball from Webster?

The first goal was a situation where Webster puts them in a 2v1 where they're going to score four out of five times.
The second goal is an unnecessary (and honestly rather cheap) penalty were giving to them.
The third goal is an insane free kick from 200 meters and there's no defending against that one. But again the free kick wasn't a result of high defending, it was a result of giving the ball away very cheaply and then fouling the player.
The fourth goal is a result of Bart giving the ball away.

None of the goals are a consequence of the high back line. There's really extraordinarly little that indicates we'd have fared better if we had given Chelsea more time, ball and space on our half of the pitch.

Neither quicker defenders or lower defence line is going to prevent us from losing when repeatedly giving the ball to the opponent in super dangerous positions.

Hmmm they still had about 3 1on1s that we got away with through poor finishing.

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

Brutal assessment of Hürzler

Chelsea’s priceless Palmer leaves Brighton all at sea https://www.theguardian.com/footbal...ff-the-cuff-maverick-with-element-of-surprise

“True, it helps if an opposition manager chooses to shoot a whaling harpoon through his own foot, which is basically what Fabian Hürzeler did here by playing if not the stupidest high defensive line of all time, then perhaps the stupidest yet. Clearly, Hürzeler is an ideologue with a set way of playing, even if that set way is destined to become an act of self-immolation.”

”So high was the Brighton line in the first half you wondered if Hürzeler had seen Lewis Dunk and Adam Webster play before, neither of whom is likely to challenge for the world indoor 60m title any time soon.”

“The moment Chelsea worked this out midway through the first half Brighton were toast, the game dissolving into an experiment into how many times Nicolas Jackson could beat Dunk in a straight footrace from the halfway line (answer: many, many times).”

 

[Weststander]

Yes.
At times Hinsh looked like a poor man’s CMS…. Headless chicken comes to mind,

Pressing the ball in the opposition half (key to Hurzelerball) must be done by the concerted effects of two or three players on tandem. Was Hinsh getting that support?

 

[Weststander]

Brutal assessment of Hürzler

Chelsea’s priceless Palmer leaves Brighton all at sea https://www.theguardian.com/footbal...ff-the-cuff-maverick-with-element-of-surprise

“True, it helps if an opposition manager chooses to shoot a whaling harpoon through his own foot, which is basically what Fabian Hürzeler did here by playing if not the stupidest high defensive line of all time, then perhaps the stupidest yet. Clearly, Hürzeler is an ideologue with a set way of playing, even if that set way is destined to become an act of self-immolation.”

”So high was the Brighton line in the first half you wondered if Hürzeler had seen Lewis Dunk and Adam Webster play before, neither of whom is likely to challenge for the world indoor 60m title any time soon.”

“The moment Chelsea worked this out midway through the first half Brighton were toast, the game dissolving into an experiment into how many times Nicolas Jackson could beat Dunk in a straight footrace from the halfway line (answer: many, many times).”

Again. Palmer won’t find an easier game in his career.

 

[One Teddy Maybank]

Pressing the ball in the opposition half (key to Hurzelerball) must be done by the concerted effects of two or three players on tandem. Was Hinsh getting that support?

No, mainly isolated.
Everything seemed very disjointed from that perspective.

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

There is a lot wrong at the moment FH is over thinking it.
I don’t like the phrase go back to basics yet we really need to.

What do you mean by back to basics mean though?

 

[peterward]

Brutal assessment of Hürzler

Chelsea’s priceless Palmer leaves Brighton all at sea https://www.theguardian.com/footbal...ff-the-cuff-maverick-with-element-of-surprise

“True, it helps if an opposition manager chooses to shoot a whaling harpoon through his own foot, which is basically what Fabian Hürzeler did here by playing if not the stupidest high defensive line of all time, then perhaps the stupidest yet. Clearly, Hürzeler is an ideologue with a set way of playing, even if that set way is destined to become an act of self-immolation.”

”So high was the Brighton line in the first half you wondered if Hürzeler had seen Lewis Dunk and Adam Webster play before, neither of whom is likely to challenge for the world indoor 60m title any time soon.”

“The moment Chelsea worked this out midway through the first half Brighton were toast, the game dissolving into an experiment into how many times Nicolas Jackson could beat Dunk in a straight footrace from the halfway line (answer: many, many times).”

Everything they say is true, and while i'm no football tactician, with the explosive, creative forward players we have, and more natural, one paced defenders..... wouldn't we be better off playing like Forest under Nuno?

Defensively solid, press from front as we do now, then counter at pace?

Even Arsenal are playing like this against the top teams.

Shirley that's going to be better than this madness against the top teams.

Liverpool, City are gonna have a field day against the high line.

Salah v Dunk

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

Cole Palmer post-match interview on MOTD: 'The manager set up a good game plan. We knew how to attack them. Literally just first time passes in behind cos their line was so high'. And there we have it folks, found out half a dozen games in. Could be a long old season

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

Great post.

I posted elsewhere, Shearer said it last weekend, most of NSC said it all week.
If everyone else could see it etc…..

I thought Hinshelwood was disappointing yesterday, no doubting his work rate, but he chased down everything which left us exposed. I think he looked far better when he went to RB.

Don’t know if anyone else noticed, but Baleba picked up a knock in the warm-up, so that didn’t help. He still was the pick of our midfield though.

Hinsh was disappointing for sure. I think partly as a result of being let down by others, but he was also naive at times. He’s young, footballing smart and no doubt will learn.

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

Looking at the numbers, Hinsh gave it away 8 times. Weiffer 9 times. Dunk 13 times.

Not sure what that proves as i didn't think Weiffer was good. But he was not the only one

What’s Webster’s stats?

 

[Littlemo]

Brutal assessment of Hürzler

Chelsea’s priceless Palmer leaves Brighton all at sea https://www.theguardian.com/footbal...ff-the-cuff-maverick-with-element-of-surprise

“True, it helps if an opposition manager chooses to shoot a whaling harpoon through his own foot, which is basically what Fabian Hürzeler did here by playing if not the stupidest high defensive line of all time, then perhaps the stupidest yet. Clearly, Hürzeler is an ideologue with a set way of playing, even if that set way is destined to become an act of self-immolation.”

”So high was the Brighton line in the first half you wondered if Hürzeler had seen Lewis Dunk and Adam Webster play before, neither of whom is likely to challenge for the world indoor 60m title any time soon.”

“The moment Chelsea worked this out midway through the first half Brighton were toast, the game dissolving into an experiment into how many times Nicolas Jackson could beat Dunk in a straight footrace from the halfway line (answer: many, many times).”

I shouldn’t laugh but this is hilarious. Poor Dunk.

Actually that’s one concern about the high line, even when we manage it effectively and the resultant goal is offside, it can’t be much good for the defenders constantly losing the races back (and they will as most defenders are slower than forwards, especially all of ours) and looking like poor players. They are all going to feel like shit after about 2 months.

It’s also not that great seeing the opposition get the ball in the net 7+ times, even if they aren’t counting.

 

[Terry Butcher Tribute Act]

What’s Webster’s stats?

Gave it away 4 times before he was hooked. Albeit one fairly spectacularly.

 

[TugWilson]

Such a bloody frustrating game yesterday , i think we played some lovely little moves , some great close control but it`s all for nothing when you hang your defenders out to dry .

 

[Weststander]

I shouldn’t laugh but this is hilarious. Poor Dunk.

Actually that’s one concern about the high line, even when we manage it effectively and the resultant goal is offside, it can’t be much good for the defenders constantly losing the races back (and they will as most defenders are slower than forwards, especially all of ours) and looking like poor players. They are all going to feel like shit after about 2 months.

It’s also not that great seeing the opposition get the ball in the net 7+ times, even if they aren’t counting.

Not good for the Dunk/JPVH/Webster hamstrings.

 

[andy_lee007uk]

I'm still seething from the result yesterday. I went into the game with an attitude that no matter what's happened between us and Chelsea in the past (I seriously detest everything about them still). That they are the better team (on paper at least) and seem to be finally becoming the team that the expensive transfers and wages would demand.

I know it's been mentioned on here many times already and this isn't "bedwetting" (how easily this word is bounded around when someone has an differing opinion to someone else).

I cannot understand why after being so exposed with our "high line" in previous games (against lesser opponents) we persist in the same old game plan?

Is it an ego thing with the Manager? Is there no plan B or even C?

At one point our defenders were nearly all standing on the halfway line. There was literally zero possibility of an offside for a Chelsea player as they literally were running from their own half!

It's so obvious that a longball over the top will result in countless opportunities.

Even when both my boys played youth football you could pick up simple things just in the warm-up from the opposition. Example, the other team practising shooting at their keeper who spills nearly every single ball or drops nearly every single catch. I'd tell my boys this and say to shoot on site and to have someone following up.

Fab has endless hours of video, analysis and algorithms and still cannot see that the high press against other teams is not going to work.

I just can't see Fab changing his ways/tactics anytime soon and I fear that this is going to be a hard season when I was so optimistic about the new Manager and signings.

Anyway, I better go put my rubber sheets on the bed as I'm sure I'll get accused of being a "bedwetter" by somepeople on here.

 

[Change at Barnham]

Such a bloody frustrating game yesterday , i think we played some lovely little moves , some great close control but it`s all for nothing when you hang your defenders out to dry .

Some of our forward play was a very high quality, even at 4-2 down I honestly believed we could still get another couple of goals.
I agree with Tug that it was so frustrating against Chelsea. Once (if) we sort out the defence we have the potential to be a side that will make opponents very nervous rather than excited.
Hopefully FH and the club analysts will be able to spot what needs to be adjusted rather than just defending deeper.

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

Some of our forward play was a very high quality, even at 4-2 down I honestly believed we could still get another couple of goals.
I agree with Tug that it was so frustrating against Chelsea. Once (if) we sort out the defence we have the potential to be a side that will make opponents very nervous rather than excited.
Hopefully FH and the club analysts will be able to spot what needs to be adjusted rather than just defending deeper.

More pace in the centre of defence will help. If we persist with a high line then Dunk has to make way for someone way quicker.