A Loss of Identity
Danny Welbeck - future Manchester United star
When Danny Welbeck scored a thirty-yard screamer against Stoke earlier this season (albeit the fifth goal of a 5-0 trouncing), he immediately became my favorite player on Manchester United. The eighteen-year-old English striker piqued my interest not because he is an integral member of the United first team (in fact, he has primarily featured in Carling and FA Cup ties this year), but because of his place of birth: he is a tried and true Mancunian, born in the southern district of Longsight.
In today’s football world, Welbeck, is something of an anomaly. To have a player feature in the first team for his hometown club is very uncommon (although another Mancunian, Paul Scholes, has been a stalwart of the United lineup for the past decade), considering football’s rapid globalization and the influx of foreign stars from all four corners of the globe into the EPL. Although globalization has caused top clubs to become worldwide brand names and reap enormous profits, this sort of commercialism has well and truly killed the regional “flavors” of football that once existed.
In England, for example, in the years of the old First Division, before South American and African players were carted in and the glamor of the Premier League seized everyone’s attention, style of play was primarily decided by geography.
Northern clubs, with their muddy pitches, were known to play the “long ball” game– i.e. a fullback or wide midfielder would play deep crosses to a burly striker who would try to cause enough confusion in the box for someone to prod the ball home. Defenders were known for bone-crunching challenges and referees were oft inclined to ignore anything short of a life-threatening injury. If you need an example of the Northern style, look no farther than Hereford vs. Newcastle in the 1972 FA Cup. Southern teams, enjoying better weather, were known to play more “attractive” football – i.e. keeping the ball on the surface and working through the middle of the field.
Today, at the top level of the game, these styles have ceased to exist, replaced instead by a homogeneous style of play characterized by speed, an emphasis on attack, a play-making midfielder, and wingers pushing up the field to the point where they almost become wide strikers.
Let’s consider the European international game as well. Back in the day, the Italians were known for their clean sheets and strong defense; the Spanish and Portuguese for their attacking flair; the Dutch for their technical and tactical proficiency; the Germans and Eastern Europe for strength and finesse; and the English for their long ball style.
While these stereotypes still exist to some extent in the international game, they have been severely muted by the introduction of the “homogeneous style.” And right now in the United States, the national team is going through its own identity crisis as well. One camp has called for the Americans to inject South American flair and tactics into the national team while the other camp has called for the team to remain true to the more traditional, European style of play it has always employed.
Obviously, the standard of play has increased tremendously as a result of these stylistic changes. But is this necessarily a good thing? In light of the mindless money-making product football has become, I doubt it. Why is the game of football concerned with progress from progress’s sake when it means the death of its very foundations? Simply put, the game has been taken away from the fans, placed in the hands of money-grubbing businessmen, a fact that we’ve all hopefully recognized by now. Of course, the situation will never change and the past is the past. We’ll never reclaim that era of homegrown talent, that era when Celtic won the European Cup with eleven Scotsmen born within thirty miles of Parkhead. Today, there’ll always be a boy in the streets of Rio or Dakar picked up by a roving scout to usurp that Glaswegian.
For the future of football, I hope Danny Welbeck breaks into the United first team and becomes a one-club man. Without him, you could replace the words “Manchester United” with “Chelsea,” “AC Milan,” or “Real Madrid.”
As a Barcelona fan, it’s easy for me to agree that homegrown talent is the greatest of traditions, that he whose youth system produces the most talent from within a few miles of the stadium is at least on moral high ground above his more purchase-oriented neighbors. But it’s not true. There is no moral high ground in developing a team nor in any one team.
You seem to be suggesting that what you describe as “the homogeneous style” is not only a disgrace to soccer/football itself, but to the “traditions” inherent in each club and that those traditions, depending on the club, are of particular stylistic importance. Are they? Should a team that has a particular style not adapt that style if that style is no longer reasonable in a climate where stadiums are well-tended and have manicured lawns? Muddy fields are bad fields — if quality soccer means anything (and perhaps it doesn’t) then why should a team not improve itself?
Do you, as a fan of ManU, really believe that your team should have nothing but locals playing when that means that the quality of your play will plummet? Don’t you, as a fan, want your team to be better than it would be if only Mancunians were playing in the side? I don’t disagree that the money-grubbing elite of the world are ruining the game in many ways, but isn’t that a reason to advocate a salary cap and spending limits rather than trashing the “new style” brought about by attempting to win leagues and tournaments through the best possible system and with the best possible players?
If you admit, and it seems you do, that the long-ball style made famous in the muddy fields in northern England is not as good as the “homogenous style”, then why shouldn’t clubs adopt the better style if it helps them win? Or should Toon replace their field with a mud puddle and get back to shoving each other around? At least the traditionalists would be happy with their relegation battle, right?
Is Man City not deserving of the same opportunities given to their cross-city rivals? Or should they, by dint of not being one of the “big clubs” be kept out in the dark, incapable of winning championships or European glory simply because, well, their tradition is to lose, so lose they should.
Also, each of the teams you listed in your last sentence, by the way, have their own homegrown talents — in fact, Real Madrid has more homegrown talent in their ranks than ManU, Chelsea, or AC Milan. I fail to see how ManU is any better a club for having Scholes and Welbeck. Like any large club, they are required to bring in talent from the rest of the world to shore up their ranks. They just have the money to do so and, in a purely theoretical sense, there’s nothing wrong with that.
If you really want teams to build from within and maintain their “traditions”, you should demand a hard league salary cap (no luxury taxes a la MLB or soft salary caps a la NBA) and spending limits within the league. Moaning about stylistic decline, a lack of tradition, and a “loss of identity” is counter-productive if you don’t couple it with real changes to the system as a whole.
Where do you get your information?
“To have a player feature in the first team for his hometown club is very uncommon (although another Mancunian, Paul Scholes, has been a stalwart of the United lineup for the past decade)”
It is NOT uncommon at Manchester United! Off the top of my head, in recent years mancunian players include:
Danny Wellbeck and
Paul Scholes – as mentioned above
Wes Brown (also from Welbeck’s neighbourhood of Longsight)
Gary Neville – club captain
Ryan Giggs (born in Wales but brought up in Manchester)
Danny Simpson
Richard Eckersley (from Salford, the area surrounding Old Trafford)
Adam Eckersley (as above)
Phil Bardsley
Phil Neville
Nicky Butt
etc..
All the above players have featured in United’s first team in the past few years. Although, granted, Phil Neville, Butt and Bardsley left a while back.
There are numerous other squad members from the surrounding areas of Lancashire. Also players such as Jonny Evans and his brother Corey who although Northern Irish have lived in Manchester with their entire family for years.