Liverpool came from behind at Anfield on Boxing Day to extend their lead to seven points, yet the question that came to my mind right afterwards was this: Is there really anything new in football?
False nines? The magnificent Magyars – Hungary’s tactical pacesetters – bamboozled England with that tack all the way back in 1953. Hidegkuti, Puskas and all that…
Overlapping fullbacks? Giacinto Facchetti was doing that for Internazionale and Italy back in the 1960s…as did the Germans Hans-Peter Briegel and Anders Brehme in the 1980s.
High defensive lines? Ariggo Sacchi’s AC Milan terrorized Serie A attacks with those suffocating offside traps nearly 40 years ago.
Football, like fashion, seems to go in cycles; live long enough, and old becomes new again.
Except for inverted wingers. The one big thing that separates the football I grew up watching in the 1980s and 1990s and what we see today is the preponderance of inverted wingers. You know what I mean: left footers playing on the right wing, right footers playing on the left.
Thirty odd years ago, that was definitely not a thing. Right footers stayed right and left footers stayed left. Except, maybe Chris Waddle.
Just think back to the great wingers of yore: Segun Odegbami and Asokie Amiesimaka of Nigeria’s 1980 Afcon winning Green Eagles are probably my earliest memory of wing tandems. In later years, it would be 1994 Afcon winners, Finidi George and Emmanuel Amuneke. Liverpool old timers will remember Steve Heighway from Bob Paisley’s sides of the late 1970s, and, of course, perhaps the greatest of them all, John Barnes, the dribbling wizard that helped Kenny Dalglish win titles in 1988 and 1990. All played on the side of their stronger foot. All the better to whip those crosses in. Today, Nigeria have Ademola Lookman and Samuel Chukwueze on “wrong” wings; Liverpool have Mohammed Salah and Cody Gakpo. Ditto.
But wingers have a different remit these days – that is if we can still call them wingers. It’s not about chalk on the boots and crosses from wide anymore; today’s wide men have to get in the box – closer to goal – and contribute more directly to goalscoring.
Goals and assists.
That’s the name of the game.
More goals than assists, thank you very much.
This is why inverted wingers are all the rage now. Much easier for a left footer to cut inside from the right to shoot on his stronger foot. What was once very much a one man show headlined by the predictable yet unstoppable Arjen Robben, has now become the norm everywhere. Just look across any league in Europe: Real Madrid (Vini Jr), Barcelona (Lamine Yamal), Arsenal (Bukayo Saka), Manchester City (Savinho), Chelsea (Noni Madueke), Atalanta (Lookman), Napoli (Khvisha Kvaratskhelia)..
It’s a little hard to recall now, but its not that long ago (2016/17) that Liverpool had the right footed Sadio Mane on the right wing and Man City had the left footed Leroy Sane on the left wing.
Liverpool’s wingers gave a pretty impressive display of modern inverted wing play at Anfield on Boxing Day, playing key roles in Liverpool’s come-from-behind 3-1 win. Cody Gakpo constantly cut inside from the left, on to his stronger right foot and Mohammed Salah, as is his wont, mirrored that on the opposite side.
As early as the third minute, Gakpo cut inside and picked out Salah with an in-swinging cross to the far post, but the Egyptian couldn’t convert. That in-swinging far post cross has become a prominent feature of Liverpool’s attack this season. It’s just one more perk of playing inverted wingers and it’s Gakpo’s main crossing play – he seldom hits the bye-line to cross with his left foot. It’s usually Salah providing the cross for Gakpo to finish though, as he’s already done for important goals against Bayer Leverkusen, Man City and Fulham this season.
When they are not crossing though, they are shooting, which is what they did to great effect against Leicester. Gakpo scored the first, a curling effort into the far post after cutting inside on to his right foot. And Salah scored the third, passed precisely into the far post after cutting inside onto his left foot.
Predictable, yet unstoppable.
