Luke Williams - Watch the Throne: The Tactics Behind the Premier Leagues European Champions, 1999-2019

First published by Pitch Publishing, 2021

Pitch Publishing

A2 Yeoman Gate

Yeoman Way

Durrington

BN13 3QZ

www.pitchpublishing.co.uk

Luke Williams, 2021

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A CIP catalogue record is available for this book from the British Library

Print ISBN 9781785317705

eBook ISBN 9781785319266

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I know that it is a clich, but this book would not have come into fruition without the help and dedication of some very important people.

Firstly, thank you to my family. Thank you to my father, Ben, for sharing all of footballs highs and lows with me (and giving me my first coaching role as his assistant manager when I was ten!) and for his proofreading, but also for being an inspirational role model every single day. Thank you to my mother, Nia, for her undying love and support and of course for her underrated levels of football wisdom! She is the strongest person that I know. Thank you to my brother, Josh, for being the person who I learned to love playing football with, and with whom I have also shared some wonderful match-going experiences.

Thank you to my girlfriend, Gemma, who also helped proofread this book. But more than that, she is a daily source of inspiration for me and I will always cherish her support. My thanks also go to Carole and Steve Brough for their support and for letting me spend hours on end analysing these matches in their study!

Of course, I am extremely grateful to Paul Camillin, Jane Camillin and Graham Hales from Pitch Publishing for their roles in bringing this book to life. Also, thank you to Duncan Olner from Olner Design for his brilliant work on the cover design.

The UEFA Champions League is the most prestigious club competition in the worlds most popular sport. Even during an era when the Beautiful Game has sometimes felt impurified by hyper-commercialisation and corporate interests, the Champions League has still blessed us with some of the greatest matches that we have ever seen nights that have changed lives, inspired millions and granted legendary status to those on the winning side of history. Personally, I feel extremely privileged to be able to say that the Champions League has given me some of the best times of my life, visiting new places and sharing priceless experiences with those who share my unadulterated passion for football.

There are many people who excellently recall their European adventures, describing famous nights from the perspectives of those on the pitch or in the stands. I do not claim to be one of them. Instead, this book focusses on those who guided their teams to glory those who formulated the game plans that gave us mere mortals the experiences that we will never forget. This book will analyse the matches that took Premier League teams and their managers to their Holy Grail, from Manchester United in 1998/99 to Liverpool in 2018/19, discussing the tactics that helped these teams to become the champions of Europe.

Some theoretical elements will be provided, but the beauty of talking tactics is that everything is open to individual interpretation. This is my take on how Ferguson, Bentez, Di Matteo and Klopp won European footballs biggest prize and I simply hope that it inspires you to consider your own view from a tactical perspective too. I hope to add tactical context to the fixtures that made these managers legends of the continental game, celebrating the incredible level of detail required to win matches at the highest level.

The games took place across a 20-year period that saw notable changes to the sport we love, many of which these managers had to adapt to and embrace in order to achieve success. I sincerely hope that the tactics that took these managers to victory provide you with the same fascination that they do myself, and I hope that you will feel inspired to continue seeing a game through a more tactical lens in the future.

Manchester United dominated English football in the 1990s, winning four Premier League titles in six seasons. However, at the start of the 1998/99 campaign their position as Englands standout side was under threat. While Blackburn Rovers journey to the title in 1994/95 was anomalous, in 1997/98 Arsne Wenger guided Arsenal to a spectacular double that saw them beat United to the title by a single point before winning the FA Cup. It was a mightily impressive performance from the London outfit in Wengers first full term in the job and the Frenchman was determined to sustain this success.

Alex Ferguson, manager of Manchester United since 1986, was under pressure to deliver a response and re-establish his teams domestic superiority. While this would be his initial priority, United supporters also hoped to see more from their side in European competition. After winning the UEFA Cup Winners Cup in 1991, United had hoped to consistently challenge for honours on the continental stage but had so far fallen short in every season since. Between the 1991/92 and 1995/96 seasons they failed to survive in Europe beyond Christmas. In 1996/97 they harboured hopes of glory until they were beaten home and away by Borussia Dortmund in the semi-final stage of the Champions League, and in 1997/98 they fell to Monaco on away goals in the quarter-final.

In the summer of 1998 United spent over 27m on three major signings: defender Jaap Stam, midfielder Jesper Blomqvist and forward Dwight Yorke. The team received another boost as captain Roy Keane returned for the new season after spending the best part of a year out with a cruciate ligament injury. Uniteds squad looked fresh and ready to pursue new heights in the 1998/99 campaign.

With the Champions Leagues expansion now requiring Englands runners-up to navigate a qualifying round before entering the group stage, Fergusons side defeated KS d 2-0 at Old Trafford before playing out a goalless draw in Poland a fortnight later. They then came through that seasons Group of Death unbeaten by drawing home and away with both Bayern Munich and Barcelona and brushing aside Brndby of Denmark. In that seasons format, the six group winners were joined in the quarter-final by the two best runners-up. United were the second-best runner-up. In contrast, Arsenal failed to make it through a group consisting of Dynamo Kyiv, Lens and Panathinaikos.

By March 1999 United were flying, unbeaten in all competitions for almost three months despite losing assistant manager Brian Kidd to Blackburn Rovers (he was initially replaced by Jimmy Ryan, then Steve McClaren). Every time they looked beaten in a match, they somehow survived week after week. Hope was growing among supporters that a historic treble of the league, FA Cup and the Champions League was actually possible, something that would require ending Uniteds 31-year wait for European club footballs biggest prize.