I was talking to my girlfriend. Told her the exact same thing after last season's Champions' League final. She slapped me, said something and left for good.
"Passion", that's what she said.
There's been a lot of chit-chat about a man called Marcelo Bielsa lately. El Loco, apparently. What's so mad about his approach? I haven't got a clue. To me, it looks very simple, "See the first pass you can make, run forward, get it back, pass if goal is occupied, score if vacant. Did you lose it? Run and get it back. Without the ball, you're just a stupid guy running in front of a crowd." They had a job to do. They've done it, twice in a fortnight against a team that claims to be magical, exhilarating, dominating, beautiful in build up and solid at the back; and more importantly, against a team that is still feared (at least till last night) across Europe. Question is, this fear, will it last?
Athletic Bilbao. They're nowhere close to being the best team in Spain. They "have a chance" of finishing third. They are a young team with no big-game experience in Europe whatsoever. Yet, they beat Manchester United, a massive football club with glorious history and grit that can only be heard of in the stories of Kings. Beat them how? With a game that is exactly that Manchester United stand for. Magical, exhilarating, dominating, beautiful in build up and solid at the back. This, observers will rightly conclude, was no fluke. Superior in every way imaginable.
So now what? Bielsa's a genius who masterminded a mid table Spanish club to Europa league victories over the great English club from Manchester. Yes. He is. But not the mad, complicated genius he is assumed to be. He's the simplest of them all. Alex Ferguson, Jose Mourinho, Pep Guardiola are all terrific modern day managers. Managers who have achieved everything in club football. But, there's something far more difficult to understand at that level: the simplicity of the game. The glorious naivety that El Loco possesses is what sets him apart from other managers.
A hard worker with meticulous preparation by attention to detail and studying teams appears to be a way of understanding his opponents' complexities and beating them with a simple counter-approach. Beating Manchester United so convincingly will attract so much attention (I won't be surprised if he receives a call in the summer from a certain Russian), but Bielsa looks to be unperturbed by success, the size of the club and in modern day football, the cash involved. Why does he do it then? Why simplify football for people and not earn enough? We look at the grim-faced man with a sense of curiosity. He paces his technical area, watching the game rarely while he does that. He sits down in one corner, observes it with no understandable display of positive emotion when things go well. Given all this, there is still an obvious passion that looks to drive the man. He outclassed Manchester United with the simplest approach to football and I look at him with awe and jealousy. Marcelo Bielsa is the passionate, simple genius of world football.
14 March 2009.
Manchester United 1-4 Liverpool.
To me, it was the day that spelled the end of Manchester United's dominance in English football. Never since have they woken up and played with an air of invincibility. They were the greatest club team for a year and a half then, starting from the day when a stylish Brazilian tore United apart, in his own violent way. United came back stronger than ever, conquering almost everything with a swagger and resilience that is the epitome of the club. Style was always there at the club, but what set it apart was the fear factor, the resilience and the Boss, who for two decades had brought about a change that very few foresaw by the end of 1990.
Manchester have since that game, been outplayed, outclassed, out-thought, out-muscled, outrun, and overpowered in exactly four games. The Champions' League finals of 2009 and 2011 and the last two games in the Europa League. Athletic Bilbao ripped United apart with poise and class, with an ease that flowed through them from their manager and like robots, they performed their tasks. Their fuel? Passion.
Fear is a very important factor in football. The mighty Barcelona, since the arrival of Guardiola have played the same way. Bielsa's way. They took time to adapt to this fresh approach. They seemed beatable in the Champions' League in 2009, and Chelsea almost pulled it off. Looking back at that night, the fans of the losing team would've been devastated. They played as well as Barcelona, if not better, and thanks to a stoppage time winner from Andres Iniesta, they failed to reach what would've been a second all-English final in a row. A victory that did not stun the world but one that fed them with supreme confidence. The final was a masterpiece. It was the game that said, "Barcelona have arrived. This is the best team in the world by a margin."
From that point onward, Barcelona was feared and to this day they are. The clinical nature of Jose Mourinho's Internazionale in front of goal and the nature of their defense (beautiful defense is hardly a term in football, but this is what it could be) were the only things that stopped them from winning two in a row. That fear is what great teams thrive on. Manchester United will still be one of the most feared teams on domestic soil. Europe is different. Power has shifted from England and the teams from Spain hold most of the cards. Without this fear, the club will be reduced to a mere League winning side, pretty much like in Europe's lesser leagues and probably only a matter of time before that disappears too. English teams have to take a leaf out of Spain's book, understand their approach and learn. Apart from Chelsea this season, no other English team has done well in Europe. Even they scraped through in the end. Arsenal played the second leg brilliantly at the Emirates against AC Milan but left themselves with too much to do in the end. The two Manchester clubs? It's obvious what they need to learn. "Europa League is not where we belong", is what they thought, but took that road and were kicked out anyway.
Decimated with a surgeon's precision, Manchester United's confidence would have taken a huge blow, but as long as the gaffer is at the club, the entire world will anticipate a stronger response not just from them but the entire English contingent. After all, there's only one reason why the game is alive and Bielsa's troops displayed that more than their wonderful display of the game.
