Zonal Marking

This diversity isn’t solely important in a footballing sense. Football is, for millions of people across Europe, the best opportunity to discover more about their neighbours. Whether the topic is Dutch liberalism, French multiculturalism or Catalan independence, football – and footballing style – often provides the introduction. That’s why football remains a window into other cultures, and a valuable artefact. European football pits countries against one another, but only for 90 minutes. In a wider sense, it does much more to bring them together.

Klopp’s greatest legacy is that the German word ‘Gegenpressing’, rather than its obvious translation as ‘counter-pressing’, is now widely used across Europe. Everyone is therefore aware of the concept’s origins and the fact that, for the first time since Beckenbauer re-defined the role of sweeper, German football has been responsible for genuine tactical innovation.

Focusing on regaining possession immediately changed the way transition football was considered. As outlined above in Chapter 10 in the discussion about the Portuguese focus on the transition, coaching courses usually explain modern football as a series of four situations, flowing continuously in a circle: the possession phase; the transition from possession to out-of-possession; the out-of-possession phase; and then the transition to possession. And repeat. But now, the defensive transition was about regaining the ball quickly and returning immediately to the possession phase, effectively short-circuiting the way football was considered. Sometimes you could watch Barcelona for an entire half and not witness their out-of-possession structure.
Klopp borrowed from this approach and spoke about it with a specific term: ‘gegenpressing’, which translates as counter-pressing. It’s sometimes misunderstood, however. Counter-pressing isn’t to pressing what counter-attacking is to attacking. It’s not necessarily countering a press, but pressing a counter.

Whereas Bayern were openly modelling themselves on the Barcelona model, Klopp positioned himself as the alternative. ‘Barcelona’s team of the last four years, with their serenity … sorry, that’s not enough for me,’ he laughed. ‘If Barcelona’s team of the last four years had been the first one that I saw play when I was four, I would have played tennis instead. I like fighting football, not serenity football; rainy day, heavy pitch, everybody has a dirty face, and then they go home and can’t play football for the next four weeks. That’s what Borussia are all about.’

A third straight final, and yet now Spain were widely criticised for being so overwhelmingly cautious. ‘Spain’s play is like love without the sex,’ said former France left-back Bixente Lizarazu.

Foolproof confirmation that a country possesses a defined footballing identity is the existence of a well-worn cliché for their national side. Ahead of a major international tournament, TV pundits are often forced to talk about national sides they haven’t watched over the previous two – or four – years, but they can nevertheless always fall back on the old caricatures.
So, just as Italy were always ‘slow starters’, Germany were always ‘efficient’ and Holland always played well before being eliminated because their players had begun arguing, Portugal now had their own stereotype – they played great football but they lacked a clinical striker.

Zidane was a throwback, more renowned for his performances in international tournaments than at club level. You picture Zidane in his country’s shirt, as you do Pelé and Maradona, whereas you think of the next generation of greats, Leo Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, in club colours. It was fitting, therefore, that Zidane’s final performance came in a France shirt at the World Cup, where he had the opportunity to go out with a bang.

Juventus owner Gianni Agnelli memorably said that Zidane was ‘more entertaining than effective’.

Nevertheless, after France’s late comeback, there was little doubt that this was Zidane’s tournament, and his teammates were remarkably complimentary about his performances. ‘Sometimes you want to stop playing just to watch him,’ marvelled Dugarry. ‘When we don’t know what to do with the ball, we give it to him,’ added Lizarazu. ‘Zidane dazzled the whole European Championship with his quality,’ concluded Petit. It felt like football had entered a new era: the BBC’s
tournament summary was headlined ‘Euro 2000: the re-birth of football’. Euro 2000 was football 2.0, and Zidane was leading the revolution.

This is essentially what defines Italian football: the absolute primacy of winning. In other major footballing nations, to varying
extents, emphasis is placed on the spectacle; attacking football is respected and sometimes considered an end in itself. But in Italy the result is paramount and the end justifies the means, which largely explains why Italian sides are content to win tactically rather than through finesse and panache.