The Mixer: The Story of Premier League Tactics, from Route One to False Nines

by Michael Cox

  The arrival of Sutton, who had only recently become a permanent centre-forward at Norwich having often played in defence, changed things in two ways. Most obviously, Newell was the major victim and started just twice in Blackburn’s title-winning season. Meanwhile, Sutton stole Shearer’s thunder, taking his status as Britain’s most expensive player. He briefly became Blackburn’s highest-paid player, too, although Blackburn immediately handed Shearer a rise to reflect his seniority. ‘Suddenly, Alan was being asked to play with a guy who wanted to score as many goals as him,’ said Le Saux. ‘That was when I saw a side of Alan that I wasn’t keen on … Alan knew his relationship with Mike revolved around himself, and neither he nor Mike reacted well when Chris broke up their partnership.’

  Sutton, a fearsome striker but a sensitive character who occasionally lacked confidence, later recalled the ‘lack of warmth’ from Shearer, blaming his friendship with Newell. When Sutton hit a hat-trick in a 4–0 victory over Coventry in Blackburn’s third game of the season, he was upset when Shearer didn’t celebrate with him. Publically, Dalglish insisted there were no problems between his two star strikers, but with Blackburn’s attacking play no longer based entirely around him, Shearer wasn’t best pleased.

  It was nevertheless a stunningly effective strike partnership. Blackburn’s opening goal of their title-winning season, away at Southampton, set the scene. Captain Tim Sherwood lofted a long pass into the box, Sutton nodded the ball down, and Shearer smashed the ball home. Simple, but effective. Blackburn now had two strikers in the penalty box whenever possible, and without Newell playing the link role, focused heavily on getting the ball wide and sending in a stream of crosses.

  As much as the SAS, Blackburn’s football was defined by their two wingers. Right-sided Stuart Ripley and left-sided Jason Wilcox were classic, touchline-hugging dribblers who sprinted to the byline and hung crosses into the box. As Dalglish put it, they were ‘proper wingers, not wide midfielders’. Nor were they goalscorers like Manchester United’s pairing of Ryan Giggs and Andrei Kanchelskis, who were capable of reaching double figures in a season, but rather facilitators, assisters and, unlike many wingers, extremely hard workers without the ball. Blackburn’s central midfielders, Sherwood and Mark Atkins (who played the majority of the season before being replaced by Batty, who returned from injury for the final five games), pushed forward in turn, the other protecting the defence. Sherwood was better in possession, Atkins cool in front of goal – the best finisher at the club, according to Dalglish – but they seldom played through-balls and instead passed calmly out wide. It was a system ‘designed for a centre-forward to score goals’, as Shearer said.

  Critics claimed Blackburn’s approach play was too predictable, but opponents found it difficult to stop, partly because of the cohesive interplay stemming from the training sessions directed by Harford, whose favourite phrase was simply ‘If it ain’t broke, don’t fit it.’ Blackburn’s training ground, incidentally, was astonishingly basic: a patch of land covered in dog mess, with no changing facilities. The players drove to Ewood Park, got changed, then drove to training. Most problematically, the training ground was adjacent to a cemetery, so sessions were frequently interrupted out of respect when a hearse slowly crept up the driveway. Harford’s ‘pattern of play’ sessions involved Blackburn lining up in their 4–4–2 formation on the training pitch, and practising their build-up play. Their passing and movement was very structured and always ended with Blackburn working the ball into crossing positions.

  There were three major approaches. Ideally, Blackburn found a winger in a position to dribble forward, their most obvious route to goal. If not, the wingers were instructed to come short, bringing the opposition full-back up the pitch and allowing Shearer or Sutton to drift wide into space. Shearer implored Sutton to do the majority of the running so he could remain in the penalty box, but actually became an excellent crosser himself, ending the campaign as Blackburn’s most prolific assister as well as their top scorer. Finally, Dalglish and Harford recognised that full-backs were the players with the most time on the ball when 4–4–2 played 4–4–2, invariably the battle of formations during this period. Right-back Henning Berg was more of a converted centre-back, so there was a huge emphasis on left-back Le Saux to push forward, and he had a fine relationship with Wilcox and Shearer, supplying many key assists, most notably hanging a cross up for Shearer to nod home in Blackburn’s penultimate match of the campaign, a 1–0 victory over Newcastle.

  Crucially, Harford demanded that crosses were played from what he termed ‘the magic box’, the space in the final 18 yards, as if the penalty area extended across the entire width of the pitch. Shearer disagreed with this concept and was confident he could convert crosses played from deeper – the type of ball David Beckham would later supply him with at international level – but Harford believed crosses from advanced positions created better chances, and Wilcox and Ripley depended upon getting into this ‘magic box’ to a staggering extent. Midway through the title-winning season, Dalglish called Ripley aside in training and attempted to devise a plan B. Eventually, he reasoned, opposition full-backs would work out Blackburn’s plan and usher Ripley and Wilcox inside. In that situation, 40 yards from goal, in a narrower position and forced onto his weaker foot, Dalglish asked where Ripley wanted the strikers to position themselves to be a target for crosses. Ripley looked at him blankly. ‘Are you taking the piss?’ he asked. No, insisted Dalglish. Ripley thought about it some more. ‘I don’t know,’ he admitted. The thought had never occurred to him; Blackburn’s wingers literally only knew how to play one way.

  Blackburn’s tactical naivety was highlighted when they encountered continental opposition. In the opening round of the UEFA Cup, the club’s first-ever game in European competition, they were drawn against Swedish part-timers Trelleborg. The nature of Trelleborg read like a stereotypical ‘European minnow’ checklist; they boasted just one full-time professional footballer, alongside a carpenter, a shopkeeper and an insurance salesman. They’d recently lost a domestic cup tie to third-division opposition, and had progressed through the UEFA Cup qualifying round with an unspectacular victory over the champions of the Faroe Islands. They arrived at Ewood Park to discover their kit clashed with Blackburn’s, so were forced to borrow Rovers’ red away shorts. Journalists had researched Blackburn’s record victory, suspecting it could be surpassed, while the Swedes later claimed they would have considered a 2–0 defeat a decent result. Instead, Trelleborg’s Frederik Sandell latched onto strike partner Joachim Karlsson’s flick-on to score the game’s only goal. Trelleborg defended deeper than anyone Blackburn faced in the Premier League and focused on doubling up against Blackburn’s wingers. ‘If you were organised you could stop them,’ said captain Jonas Brorsson.

  ‘There was potentially a bit of naivety in the way we played,’ Ripley later recalled. ‘We were steamrollering teams in England and I think we tried to do the same, but they came with a defensive formation and nicked the win.’ Le Saux, meanwhile, admitted Blackburn’s style didn’t suit European competition. The second leg finished 2–2 – the SAS both scored close-range efforts in the aftermath of set-pieces – and ten-man Trelleborg progressed 3–2 on aggregate. The early exit emphasised English clubs’ tactical inadequacy, but allowed Blackburn to concentrate on domestic football.

  There were no defining victories during Blackburn’s title campaign – they lost home and away to their closest challengers, Manchester United, and stuttered badly during the run-in, but their simple approach proved enough to consistently defeat run-of-the-mill Premier League sides. Blackburn weren’t doing anything different, they were simply doing it in an extremely cohesive manner, with excellent players. Six of their starting XI (goalkeeper Tim Flowers, commanding centre-back Colin Hendry plus Le Saux, Sherwood, Sutton and Shearer) featured in the PFA Team of the Year, which was announced before Blackburn sealed their title.

  Manchester United had clinched the first two Premier League titles ant
iclimactically when rivals slipped up, but 14 May 1995 was truly memorable, as the Premier League’s first final-day decider. Blackburn went 1–0 up at Liverpool when Shearer typically converted Ripley’s right-wing cross, and had Rovers maintained that scoreline, they were champions regardless of United’s result. But Liverpool produced an unlikely turnaround, with Jamie Redknapp’s superb late free-kick confirming a 2–1 home victory. Dalglish spent much of the second half watching a TV close to the dugouts, showing the action from Manchester United’s game at Upton Park: Sir Alex Ferguson’s decision to play a lone striker backfired, and West Ham’s Ludĕk Mikloško provided one of the Premier League’s all-time great goalkeeping displays. United could only draw 1–1, which meant Blackburn’s defeat was irrelevant – they were champions. Dalglish was congratulated by old friends from Liverpool’s backroom staff, Shearer and Sutton warmly embraced, Sherwood lifted the trophy.

  For all this incredible drama, Blackburn’s previous visit to Merseyside was more significant stylistically. On April Fools’ Day, Blackburn stormed into an early 2–0 lead at Everton; the first goal came inside 13 seconds, then the quickest to date in the Premier League, when Berg’s long ball was headed on by Sutton, then by Shearer, and Sutton fired home. The second came after a free-kick found Sutton, who stumbled and allowed Shearer to fire home. It was textbook Blackburn. But then, after Graham Stuart got Everton back into the game with a stupendous chip, Blackburn embarked upon a remarkably blatant display of cynical football, concentrating upon breaking up play and time wasting. It was an incredibly fierce, frantic contest, with the highlight an incredible goalmouth scramble in front of Tim Flowers, which featured no fewer than 14 players inside Blackburn’s six-yard box. The climax saw Shearer thumping a clearance so far that he nearly sent the ball out of Goodison Park entirely. At full-time, Everton’s fans booed Blackburn off. Dalglish couldn’t care less about whether opposition supporters appreciated his side’s style of play. To him it was three points, and job done.

  In stark contrast, when Kevin Keegan was asked for his favourite memory from Newcastle’s ‘nearly’ campaign of 1995/96, he recalled his players being applauded onto the pitch by opposition fans during the final few days of the season, away at Leeds and Nottingham Forest. Dalglish called his Blackburn side the ‘people’s champions’, playing on their underdog status, but Newcastle were the true neutral’s favourite, a team who played enthralling, attack-minded football. Keegan’s impact during this period was incredible; he took the club from the bottom-half of the second tier to the top of the Premier League, galvanising a whole city. Newcastle’s shirts displayed the blue star of the Newcastle Brown Ale logo, their goalkeeper’s shirt during 1995/96 depicted the city’s skyline, while Keegan spoke about the club’s cultural importance to the city in a manner that recalled Barcelona. At times their football was comparable too, and Newcastle were referred to as, simply, The Entertainers.

  Newcastle earned that nickname a couple of seasons earlier, with a 4–2 victory over Sheffield Wednesday, but 1995/96 took things to a new level, and Newcastle’s title challenge was somehow befitting of British pop culture at the time. 1996 was the year of England hosting, and threatening to win, Euro 96, soundtracked by Baddiel and Skinner’s ‘Three Lions’. 1996 was when Britpop still reigned supreme. 1996 saw the launch of Chris Evans’s TFI Friday, a programme based largely around wackiness, and the debut of the loud, extroverted Spice Girls. 1996 was the year of Trainspotting, a film about a group of heroin addicts that managed to become a feelgood story. Somehow 1997 felt very different, a melancholy year dominated by the film Titanic, Radiohead’s OK Computer and the death of Princess Diana. 1996 was about mad-for-it extravagance, and here were Keegan’s Newcastle, The Entertainers, playing all-out-attack football with no regard for the consequences.

  Newcastle started the season, like Blackburn the previous year, with tactics based around crossing. Left-winger David Ginola was signed from Paris Saint-Germain and bamboozled opposition right-backs with his pace and ambidexterity, able to receive the ball with his back to goal, before spinning either way, cutting inside or going down the touchline. He won Player of the Month immediately. On the opposite flank Keith Gillespie was a typical winger of that period, always reaching the byline. Keegan’s instructions to his wingers were simple: new signing Les Ferdinand was the best target man in the business, and he was to be supplied with constant crosses. ‘The way the side was playing, with Ginola on the left and Gillespie on the right, was ideal for a striker like me,’ Ferdinand recalled. ‘Both David and Keith were raining balls into the penalty area from all over the place.’

  Amazingly for such an aerial threat, Ferdinand was only five foot 11, but was blessed with a prodigious leap. He hit 21 league goals by mid-February, while Keegan encouraged him to develop his game and bring teammates into play, having become frustrated with his predecessor Andy Cole’s single-mindedness. Whereas Blackburn used two target men up front, Keegan played Peter Beardsley in a deep-lying forward role, linking attacks. With Rob Lee bursting forward from central midfield, this was the most complete attacking force the Premier League had witnessed. Newcastle started at an incredible pace, attempting to win matches within the opening half hour, and weren’t involved in a single goalless draw all season. ‘The Entertainers’ tag, however, also underlined Newcastle’s defensive frailties. Keegan had openly preached a ‘you score two, we’ll score three’ philosophy, although the defining game in Newcastle’s season – and the most memorable in the Premier League era – was the defeat at Liverpool in April, which was ‘we’ll score three, you score four’. Many attributed Newcastle’s title failure to their leaky defence, although the truth is more complex.

  Keegan made no attempt to hide his attacking approach. He was determined to satisfy the Geordies’ thirst for positive football, and considered himself part of a wider movement to make football more exciting, at a time when managers frequently highlighted the fact their team had ‘put on a show’ when matches were live on Sky. ‘A lot of forwards are coming into management,’ he said at the time. ‘You look at Brian Little, Glenn Hoddle, myself. We are all forwards who wouldn’t really know enough about defending to coach it.’ It was a selective argument, though. Arsenal boss George Graham had been a forward, then later an attacking midfielder so languid he was nicknamed ‘Stroller’, but he had assembled the most disciplined defence in English football.

  Keegan’s defenders were, originally, midfielders and attackers. It’s common for players to be shifted into a different position as they develop, but Newcastle’s situation was quite remarkable, particularly with their three main centre-backs. Darren Peacock had been a centre-forward in the Bristol Rovers youth team. Steve Howey had risen through Newcastle’s ranks as an attacking midfielder, occasionally used in defence during training – but when Keegan arrived, he told Howey he was either a centre-back or he was leaving. Belgian Philippe Albert, meanwhile, started his career as a midfielder and was recruited on the strength of his displays at the 1994 World Cup, where he continually brought the ball forward from the back. Keegan, working as a TV pundit for the tournament, witnessed him score against both the Netherlands and Germany, and snapped him up.

  First-choice full-backs Warren Barton and John Beresford were encouraged to push forward simultaneously and, by the end of the campaign, were replaced by hometown lads Steve Watson and Robbie Elliott, both forwards when rising through the ranks at Newcastle. Another Geordie, holding midfielder Lee Clark, had played an attacking midfield role the previous season, hence his number 10 shirt. It was, more or less, a team of forwards, as Keegan acknowledges in an admirably honest passage from his autobiography. ‘Were my full-backs too adventurous? Yes! Were my centre-backs too skilful, better going forward than going back? Yes! But that is what we built.’ That was that, and Keegan wasn’t going to change. Towards the end of the campaign, his back four – Watson, Howey, Peacock and Beresford – approached him, suggesting they were being overrun and Newcastle should play more cau
tiously. Keegan’s response to the critique was simple – ‘Do you wanna play on Saturday?’

  He ignored defending to a remarkable extent. Newcastle had a rare defensive training session ahead of the long trip down to Southampton in September, lost 1–0, and Keegan never bothered with defensive drills again. Later, after Newcastle failed to win the Premier League, Keegan appointed former Liverpool defender and BBC pundit Mark Lawrenson as a defensive coach. Lawrenson, however, spent his time merely observing training and didn’t take a single coaching session under Keegan, at one point confessing to him that he wasn’t sure what he was being paid for. His appointment was Keegan’s attempt to fight the criticism rather than a genuine attempt to fix the problem.

  But, amazingly, Newcastle’s defensive record in 1995/96 was actually reasonably good, and that famous 4–3 defeat at Anfield has exaggerated their weakness at the back. They conceded 37 goals in 38 matches, only two more than Manchester United, and considering the subsequent four title winners conceded 44, 33, 37 and 45 goals, Newcastle’s defensive record wasn’t a barrier to success. Instead, their problem was that they didn’t score enough, managing only 66 goals – lower than every single Premier League title winner. The ‘Entertainers’ tag wasn’t entirely true, and for all their individual brilliance, Newcastle lacked cohesion. It wasn’t simply that they ignored defensive work in training, more that they didn’t do any tactical work whatsoever. No work on shape, no work on build-up play, no work on set-pieces. Nothing that makes a group of players into a team.