Football

You are reading a single comment by @dst2 and its replies. Click here to read the full conversation.

•

dst2

Interesting tho.

Most of the players who were most influential are deep-lying players such as center backs or holding midfielders, but you also see more advanced midfielders who are central to the network. One example is Luka Modrić for Croatia or Juan Quintero for Colombia. There are also midfielders who have striking capability, such as Griezmann, Neymar, and Bryan Ruíz of Costa Rica.

England had Walker, Stones and Henderson. Suppose it suggests what a lot of the analysis has said, to get to the next level of threatening to win we need a player who can be influential 'on the passing network' further up the field.

•

tbc in reply to @dst2

All three of Belgium's were centre backs as well, and they were also semi-finalists, whereas two of Spain's were more attacking players and they didn't get as far.

I'm not sure how much this alone can illuminate, as there are still different styles of play, and you can pass around a lot in midfield with little end product and not get as far as a deep-lying counter-attacking side.

About

Avatar for dst2 @dst2 started