Welcome to guru day at Old Trafford. On the 29th anniversary of Eric Cantona’s arrival at Manchester United, the equally fascinating Ralf Rangnick prepared to walk through the door. If it is the cult of personality United were looking for they appear to have bagged a classic of the type.
Rangnick’s status as the father of “gegenpressing” has been wreathed in iridescent tribute since United’s imminent swoop became apparent. We can pass over the thorny arguments about the origins of winning the ball back quickly as a philosophical ideal. Rangnick’s early association with the concept is validation enough for our purposes and his pedigree so blindingly obvious – all of a sudden – that we can’t have him in the post soon enough.
All that intelligence, knowledge and understanding that birthed the careers of Jurgen Klopp, Thomas Tuchel and Julian Nagelsmann available on tap at United. Get the metal polish out.
If only it were that easy. Antonio Conte is discovering at Spurs the life lesson passed down by the great Angelo Dundee, hailed as one of the finest boxing trainers of all time. Dundee knew enough about the business to credit his brilliance to the genius of those whose hands he wrapped. Any trainer would look good in the corner of Muhammad Ali and Sugar Ray Leonard, he modestly argued. He wasn’t quite the MAN before he followed them into a ring, he said.
The big hope at United is that Rangnick might have the same impact as Tuchel, who inherited a failing group at Chelsea and by instilling a sense of purpose and organisation turned around results immediately. Tuchel made the case for experience, or rather against inexperience. A coach has to have talent too.
What Frank Lampard and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer shared was a deep understanding of the game they played at the highest level and insufficient grounding in the disciplines of leadership and instruction. The reputations and linked sentimentality that fast-tracked both into their lofty posts was of no help in the face of the matchday reality. To cope with that you need a track record, personality and character.
Klopp, Tuchel and, of course, Pep Guardiola have a surfeit of the right stuff. Rangnick is presumed to have the same, if not the medals to show for it. Schalke apart, he has rarely been at a club with the abundance of a United. Yet even here he will find out quickly enough that quality is not spread evenly.
Gegenpressing is more than a reliance on lungs and determination. Both are necessary attributes but not sufficient. Fred and Scott McTominay will run all day but as Solskjaer discovered, it is of little use if you can’t pick the pass and the ball is gifted back to the opposition.
It is hard too to see how Paul Pogba or Anthony Martial prosper in the Rangnick system. Both are capable of supreme moments but in the round Pogba lacks positional discipline while Martial appears swamped by introspection. Nemanja Matic, an important player in his first 18 months at the club, simply does not have the legs anymore.
On the plus side, Eric Bailly and Arron Wan-Bissaka are two players with the requisite athleticism who might benefit from the right attention, instruction and support.
The one player attracting greatest attention through the Ranglick prism is Cristiano Ronaldo, presumed a problem because of a perceived unwillingness to put in the hard yards and his diva-like power and influence. The eye wanders to the French capital to see comparisons with Leo Messi, Neymar and Kylian Mbappe at Paris Saint-Germain. Surely Barcelona is a better example, where Guardiola showed how it is possible to accommodate one wandering star within the team framework.
Besides a discerning observer at Villarreal on Tuesday might have clocked one blue-shirted figure clapping his hands to urge his team-mates to up the ante as he charged about the opponent’s back line at pace, and without the ball. That player was Ronaldo, who would later lob United into the lead with his sixth Championship League goal and his tenth of the season.
The idea that Ronaldo is some kind of rampant soloist is easy to grasp and has a strong hold in the understanding of many. I recall putting this to a former United team-mate, Owen Hargreaves, at a gala dinner. Hargreaves could not have been more fulsome in his praise of Ronaldo or forthright in his debunking of the prevailing view. He never had a more giving team-mate, he said, a team player through and through.
Maybe Rangnick should give Hargreaves a call. He will at least hear the testimony in his mother tongue, though as a noted Anglophile he has arguably better English than Ronaldo advocate Hargreaves. We shall find out his preferences soon enough. And remember: Rangnick arrives as a realist not a miracle worker.
from Football – inews.co.uk https://ift.tt/3cTLrK9
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