Arsenal's threat from set pieces reminded me of Dave Bassett, who once discovered that his Wimbledon team at their peak averaged a goal from every thirteen corner kicks.
“Good delivery, smart movement, decoys, blocks, lots of variety,” Bassett said as he picked up the phone. 'Arsenal are working hard at it and they are having success, but the way everyone is going about it as if they have made a wonderful new discovery, what a load of old cod.'
It's reassuring to know that at 80, he's as combative as ever. Wimbledon weren't the only team to get set pieces right in the 1980s, but no one did it better.
Bassett's fascination with the subject began when he was representing English amateurs and playing under Charles Hughes, who became the FA's much-maligned director of coaching.
“We beat West Germany 1-0 with a tap-in just in front of the post and I realized that was a good way to win tight games,” Bassett said.
Hughes, who died this year aged 91, was among those inspired by the early data analysis of Charles Reep, whose statistical work on maximum chance positions is often credited with the rise of the long ball game.
At Wimbledon, Bassett had dead-ball experts such as Dennis Wise, Wally Downes and Glyn Hodges who spent hours perfecting their throw using a colored shirt wrapped around a goal post to indicate the required height.
He also had aerial skills. Not just the big players who could take the lead, but also those who fought through the crowd despite the dangers just to get to the end of the crosses.
The main target was usually Alan Cork, who created many routines himself before nurturing them during his own coaching career.
“I would lie in bed at night thinking about free-kicks and corners, trying to find a new one,” Cork said. He scribbled them all down in a notebook until it was lost while working in Coventry (he suspects it was stolen).
His son Jack, who now coaches Burnley's Under 21s, searches for his favourites. “Forget the ball and worry about your trajectory,” is Cork Sr.'s best tip. “If your job is to hit the nearest post, hit the nearest post.”
Wimbledon's finest hour, the 1988 FA Cup win against Liverpool, came down to a free-kick wide, fired towards Cork by Wise as he attacked the near post. It was exceeded, but they took it into account.
Lawrie Sanchez's job was to shadow Cork's point in case it was overmatched and his glancing header beat Bruce Grobbelaar.
Cork scored a winner at Anfield last season after Bassett pieced together VHS footage to show the Liverpool defender leaving his post to track a runner and the gap he left was rarely closed.
So they came up with a plan. Hodges lured the defender away, Mark Morris came in to touch Wise's corner and Cork headed in at the back post.
“We were so good we thought we would always score one,” Cork said. 'We were one up before we started. Everything was right and it was very difficult to defend.”
Confidence grew. Cork recall a disagreement with an Oxford United coach during an FA course. “He was trying to do zonal marking and I said, 'I'm not being rude, but I just scored five against you because of your zonal marking.'
Dave Kemp was part of Bobby Gould's coaching staff at Wimbledon when they won the FA Cup, making set-pieces that were central to a successful coaching career.
He recognized them as David's slingshot against Goliaths and refined them over twenty years, defying gravity with clubs such as Stoke City and West Bromwich Albion as assistant to Tony Pulis.
“It's about the delivery, but it's about the timing of the run and the angle of the opening of the run,” Kemp says. 'Nobody can stop what Arsenal are doing because most of them mark zonally.
'Five or six players make runs from the back of the penalty area, good delivery and defenders can't see them because they're looking at the ball and static, under the ball at the point of contact. I would think about marking the front and back areas and the rest man to man.'
Retired in California, Kemp rarely misses a game on TV and finds himself looking forward to new routines for set pieces. The irony that Arsenal have become new masters of the trade is not lost on him.
Arsene Wenger belittled Stoke as 'a rugby team' for their strength at set pieces, including Rory Delap's long throws.
Now Mikel Arteta and Nicolas Jover are building a title bid on set-piece power, exceptional performances and big players, strong in the air with a genuine desire to get their head on the ball, imaginative routines and all the modern digital video and data analyses. software.
It's billed as a new branch of football science, but that's perception for you.
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