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Thread: What happened to “man marking”

  1. #1
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    What happened to “man marking”

    When you see the likes of Salah and others scoring goals for fun it makes me wonder why opposing managers don’t put one of their own defenders close to him for 90 mins instead of letting them run free. I know it would occupy one of your own players for most of the game but surely it would go a long way to nullify the opposition’s dangerous player.Liverpool would not have been half as effective as they have been. In the days when Shankly , Clough etc were in charge I am sure they instructed their defenders to “follow them to the toilet” if they had to. I just can’t understand why defences let these type of players have the freedom of the park for 90 minutes.Anyone got any thoughts on this.?

  2. #2
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    It's all down to the fans who would complain like mad, because playing this way means that you are boring and should be playing all out attacking football to try to score more than the opposition rather than stopping them scoring!.
    Burnley's success this season has been built up on a solid defence and a team playing to a system which makes them difficult to break down, however, the biggest critics of this are our own fans, even though it has enabled us to be in a good league position throughout the season.
    We are lucky because we have some good defenders and it works for us, however, quite a number of the other clubs do not have the discipline to man mark and probably don't want to play that way anyway because the game has changed.

  3. #3
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    Quote Originally Posted by malwayne View Post
    When you see the likes of Salah and others scoring goals for fun it makes me wonder why opposing managers don’t put one of their own defenders close to him for 90 mins instead of letting them run free. I know it would occupy one of your own players for most of the game but surely it would go a long way to nullify the opposition’s dangerous player.Liverpool would not have been half as effective as they have been. In the days when Shankly , Clough etc were in charge I am sure they instructed their defenders to “follow them to the toilet” if they had to. I just can’t understand why defences let these type of players have the freedom of the park for 90 minutes.Anyone got any thoughts on this.?
    It’s probably breaching equalities legislation.
    Seriously though Lennon got Hibs to do this against Celtic and it won them the game. On the other hand I remember Alex Elder having to follow Stanley Matthews all over the park in one of his first games for us. Matthews made him look stupid.

  4. #4
    It's a tactic that has gone out of fashion.

  5. #5
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    Quote Originally Posted by malwayne View Post
    When you see the likes of Salah and others scoring goals for fun it makes me wonder why opposing managers don’t put one of their own defenders close to him for 90 mins instead of letting them run free. .Anyone got any thoughts on this.?
    I often think the same thing mwayne - but doesn't even go as far as following them around - i.e with Kane or Vardy...they can just hang out waiting for the pass and tap in - how the defence didn't see or know to cover them is beyond me - could be that teams/players aren't as connected as they were - the ability to read and anticipate has lost a lot of it's power...or they're simply just overpayed lazy pretenders that dream it to another.






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    Last edited by Norder; 23-04-2018 at 08:42 PM.

  6. #6
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    I think back in the day there were quite a few 'one man teams' around, stop Matthews and you stopped Blackpool, stop Finney and you stopped Preston etc. These days none of the top six are one man teams, they all have several players who can hurt you. What's the point of a defender shadowing Salah for 90 minutes when Firmino and Mane are also capable of destroying you, and which of half a dozen at City do you put your man marker on ?

  7. #7
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    Quote Originally Posted by sinkov View Post
    I think back in the day there were quite a few 'one man teams' around, stop Matthews and you stopped Blackpool, stop Finney and you stopped Preston etc. These days none of the top six are one man teams, they all have several players who can hurt you. What's the point of a defender shadowing Salah for 90 minutes when Firmino and Mane are also capable of destroying you, and which of half a dozen at City do you put your man marker on ?
    A "man marker" is normally a Nobby Styles type of player (some won't know who the hell I'm talking about!).

    More destructive than creative.

    Creative players would not be too happy to be used this way.

    Put in a "destroyer" and you change the team structure/dynamics.

    But that's still a reasonable tactic to be used on some teams I do agree.

    There are prime team players such as Mooy of Huddersfield who, if marked out of the game, would reduce the team's effectiveness by quite a bit. Knockaert of Brighton is another.

    Put a player to mark our Cork and we would feel it. However this marker would have to be prepared to run many miles each game!

    Pointless as a ploy against the top teams I agree as there are too many movers and shakers.

    But the occasional use of a "marker" would be an interesting ploy to use--particularly as this has gone out of fashion as it would really pee off the marked player.

  8. #8
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    .

    as said....it depends on who your up against - I guess you'd work out the value of it - you could shut the player down, take out a strength and lose a man doing it, but if there were weaknesses elswhere...then as beneficial as a player may seem - as soon as they pass that ball the percentages drop - in that case - perhaps better to tackle the game from the weak end.

    ....glad to see less of the inert ball watching - this season.

    Man-marking costing Burnley the win....

    https://www.pastemagazine.com/articl...ways-work.html


    Last edited by Norder; 24-04-2018 at 01:48 PM.

  9. #9
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    Interesting example norder. Both goals were conceded from set pieces and involved the well worn practice used by Tony Pulis's teams of managing to foul the opposition without being spotted by the referee. His teams always manage the art and we were very naive a couple of years ago.

  10. #10
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    Quote Originally Posted by Supersub6 View Post
    Interesting example norder. Both goals were conceded from set pieces and involved the well worn practice used by Tony Pulis's teams of managing to foul the opposition without being spotted by the referee. His teams always manage the art and we were very naive a couple of years ago.
    they worked on that other (big) weakness - Sub.


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