For Sports on Earth
We Went There: USMNT Beats Turkey As the World Cup Looms
Why Soccer Tactics Matter: A Player Explains
What makes a team great isn't its tactics as a whole. It's the team's ability to get those thousand parts turning instinctually. The team that wins the World Cup won't do so because it has the best game plan. It would take tremendous balls to say that gegenpressing is inherently better than tiki-taka or a traditional 4-4-2 block, and history has shown us that each game plan can work. The winning team will simply execute whichever game plan that it chooses well. Both Spain and Brazil tried to keep possession with a pass-and-move philosophy in 2010, but Spain's players understood how to pass and move with each other better. "Tiki-taka" means nothing unless the players in the midfield know what space to find to become an option. Tactics demand clarity, a player understanding his role within the tactic at any given moment. The taka has to be there for the tiki.
This is an excellent paragraph.
