Reset: Spring collapses into summer, and we’re hanging on in Serie A, three points behind Inter and even with Milan but with two games in hand over both. We’ve just played our Champions League quarterfinal against Barcelona, a tie in which fully seven players—three on their team, four on ours—once played for the other team. As you’d expect, it was a completely placid and sportsmanlike encounter.
Song clip: Acoustic Ladyland, “Sport Mode”
Up next: Milan, in a repeat of our grueling Champions League semi from 2020. In the league, we lost to Milan in mid-March (not an omen), but then followed that up with sizable wins over Torino and Napoli, but then followed those up with a ridiculous 0-3 loss to Siena and a hard-fought 1-1 draw against Roma (possibly an omen). Because football loves heart attacks, the 1910 Derby is sandwiched between our two Champions League fixtures against Milan, so our season may well be settled by a two-week stretch during which we only play teams from that one city and I grow ever closer to burning La Scala to the ground. I don’t mean that, of course. It’s just a tense hour at the Naming Rights. Trenches are being dug. Wish us victory.
Read More: Football Manager 2009, Pixel Dramas, Pro Vercelli
by Brian Phillips · September 17, 2009
Flawless, as usual.
Sounds like Benny Hill for the indie set.
This song is perfect. Blur – Song 2 for 2022.
If only all Champions League knockout ties were as wonderfully freescoring as that one, although the result mustn’t have been in doubt after Vercelli went 7-3 up before HT at the Nou. The music expresses the madness within perfectly.
Who got the red card at 01.27, out of interest?
Matteo Marino, the same guy who gave up the penalty. A lot of players lost their heads in that game, but he was the only one to show up with a blowtorch.
I thought we had it sealed when we went up 7-3 with a man advantage, but Barça put three past us to make it 7-6 before Sammarco stole that last goal at the end. By that point, we still had history’s most improbable away-goals advantage, but I can’t say I wasn’t sweating those last 10 minutes. Especially after we’d been up 3-1 with 13 minutes to play in the first leg, only to finish with a draw.
Greatest show on earth, to be sure, but the defending, especially in that first leg, was . . . not all that it might have been. Enough to make you question your decision to “blow it all up” and reinvent Pro Vercelli? Or enough to make you rub your hands together and laugh a maniacal laugh?
On the whole, our defending has been okay this season—25 goals in 31 league games isn’t bad, all things considered. But we’re in a wicked slump lately, to the point that I’ve just angered the whole team by telling the press I thought the defense was the weakest part of our team.
I don’t regret switching to the 3-4-3, because I’ve been enjoying the way we play and the fact that we spend so much more time with the ball in our opponents’ half. But yeah, we clearly haven’t worked out all the kinks yet. I should probably work up a plan for swapping a striker for a defensive mid when we’re leading by two against Barcelona with 10 minutes left in a game.
Who was the trampled Verceli player during the last goal? I like how the other players just hopped over him to celebrate.
I find that a flat four in the middle with forward runs by the wingers, and none by the central mids works well. Combine that with three central defenders with limited runs, and the defense shores up alright.
You could drop your wide midfielders to wingback positions when you get up in a match. The deeper position could help. I find the wide mids are the key in a 3-4-3. Limit their runs forward or drop them back, and you shore up your defense significantly. That will still leave you 3 up front to overload the defense.
That was young Michele Proietti, who had just picked up an ankle sprain that would sideline him for six weeks. Wonderful compassion from my guys, isn’t it?
At least he isn’t a diver. If he was he would have popped up after the goal went in beacause then the penalty wouldn’t have been needed.
That’s some shocking defending from Barca there…so good to see old habits die hard.