BFW Analysis: The science of decision-making in football

The top players in world football all have something in common, something players in lesser environments fail to grasp: the concept of playing it simple. In very few cases do professional footballers attempt to play the game by themselves, rather executing simpler tasks which they can do with a high success rate. It’s what separates a good player from a great player, the ability to humbly move the ball on without being a key part of every move.

This quality of being able to make simpler decisions is of course not uniform amongst the top level, and the players who lean on such decisions more than ambitious ones tend to be some of the best players to watch from a tactical perspective, as everything they do is in structure and shows the team functioning at their most fundamental level with no individual decisions making the shape different to what it was on the whiteboard. The urge to affect play is instinctual to all, and none more so than professionals, so the ability to hold off on making such an ambitious play is the hallmark of what most consider to be an ‘intelligent’ player. With their ability to keep play structured, it often creates a point around which the entire team can pivot, so when these players finally take decisions that break the general patterns of the game, it tends to completely change the landscape of the pitch, creating space and time for something big to happen, rather than players who are known for their hunger to take players on or attempt final balls, something that is easy to halt when it appears in consistent patterns.

In leash-less confusion, I’ll wander the concrete: Less is more

Wonder if better now having survived.

The most famous example of the ‘less is more’ principle in football is perhaps the reign of one Sergio Busquets over FC Barcelona’s midfield. The Spaniard was a menace from deep, being an option for practically any player on the pitch at any given time to allow Barcelona to either move the ball forward or return it to a place on the pitch where the ball is less likely to be lost and a new move can be constructed. Busquets’ consistency combined with one of the most press-resistant technical skillsets in the history of the game created a foundation for some of the most fluid and relentless assaults on opposition penalty boxes. However, Busquets has recently been usurped in the Spain national team by a player who has a different set of skills but has similarly conquered the world: Rodri. Rodri differs from Busquets in that he is not as assured against the press by himself, as he tends to release the ball to provide relief from pressure than being able to turn and twist his way out of such situations. However, Rodri is far more dangerous when he’s breaking the lines than Busquets, as he is far more capable at attacking space and executing blows in the final third.

This concept of simple decision-makers is not exclusive to the position of defensive midfield however, it is common to all players, especially ones who function primarily with the ball at their feet rather than half a pitch’s length away from it, i.e. the build-up specialists and other deep-lying players who occasionally venture forward as opposed to front-line forwards. Coaches are favouring smart players over technically gifted ones more and more, with a popular narrative being that football has regressed as a sport, being reduced to automatons executing their programmed functions rather than individuals melding into a unit with their jagged edges and eccentricities in tact. This narrative is not unfounded as recent systems have favoured less individually brilliant players than ones of yesteryear, but the narrative is still dramatised and oversimplified rhetoric fuelled by nostalgia. With that said, let’s get into what makes coaches prioritise such players.

Babygirl, bring out the goodies: How coaches integrate systems into individuals

Photo by F. Noever/FC Bayern via Getty Images

Snuck it in inside her hoodie, now we turnin’ up to boogie.

With football games getting more and more structured with every year that passes, coaches are craving that extra bit of control, which can only come with players who are completely clued in to the system but the practically infinite number of possible situations that can occur on a pitch make it impossible for coaches to drill every single position and decision into players, especially in the pathetic length of a human lifetime.

Coaches must then adapt to the limits of the human time-scale, and they do so by compartmentalising all possible game situations into categories that each have a broad-strokes action that is most appropriate, with players having to identify what situation they’re in and take the desired action for the next state of play to become active. This is once again where decision-makers who lean towards the simple are favoured over the ambitious, as they are more likely to take decisions that fall within the bounds of a coach’s acceptable moves in a certain position. This is not to say that they do not take individual decisions at all, but rather that they tailor their playstyle to the team and system’s needs.

A perfect example of this is Adam Aznou at Bayern Munich, who has only just had his first taste of first-team minutes with a couple of appearances in pre-season from both the left-back and right-back positions. Aznou is naturally left-footed, but his game intelligence is such that he is able to adapt his body orientation to whatever situation he is in, and serve the system as best he can from whatever area of the pitch he’s on. Aznou is capable of technical brilliance, yes, but those moments come not to serve himself, but when the team really needs something beyond what the system offers. When in build-up and even in the final third, Aznou very much plays it the way Vincent Kompany wants his full-back to play, but rather than having his great base attributes challenged by Kompany’s principles, the new guidelines Aznou plays under have only augmented his base fundamentals and raised his performances as a result. The ability to show such consistent performances on opposing sides of the field at such a young age under a coach who no doubt puts heavy emphasis on build-up structures and defensive shape is the signature of a once-in-a-generation mind for the game.

However, the concept of the full-back itself is a changing one, and perhaps one of the most important tactical narratives in all of world football at the moment. It’s an issue that can (and will very soon) be expanded into a piece all on its own about the intricacies of the different ways coaches are using full-backs at the moment, both as offensive and build-up pieces, as well as defensive pieces.

I’m one of those witches, babe: The difference between the instinctual and the trained

Photo by James Gill – Danehouse/Getty Images

Just don’t try to save me, ‘cause I don’t want to be saved.

The ability to identify game situations and immediately react to them requires the player in question to have exceptional logic and thinking skills, as the solution to their position should not be something that requires intense thought but rather a subconscious, almost impulse decision. These kinds of players are rare to come by when they do, they are a special treat for coaches as they are capable of adapting to pretty much any system and any role within the system, whether they are put to the side or are the figure the team is built around. Examples of this that go further up the field are players such as Bayern’s Thomas Müller, Manchester City’s Kevin De Bruyne and Inter Miami’s Lionel Messi. These are players who in the final third require basically no extra coaching, as their decision-making is practically faultless as long as the coach has given them and the players around them a general set of principles to work with. On the other hand, there are players with exceptional technical and physical attributes that require a very specific set of circumstances to reach their ceiling. These players are not lacking in logical skills by any means, rather their profile is best used in specific systems, requiring closer attention from coaches to know how to react to different situations as they function better within stricter principles than if left to their instincts — examples of such players include Juventus’ Dušan Vlahović, Bayern’s Leon Goretzka and Bayer Leverkusen’s Granit Xhaka.

Note that Xhaka is an example of a player who excels within more rigid guidelines but is part of a Leverkusen team that have shown a lot of fluidity, showcasing that Xabi Alonso has adapted his tactics and management to create fluidity between the players who excel in multiple zones while using the players who prefer a singular kind of area as a fulcrum to hinge the team on — Xhaka, Exequiel Palacios, Jeremie Frimpong, etc. This is a great showcase of how coaches can build a team and tactic with sprinkles of both kinds of players. In fact, most teams (notable exception: Arsenal who have almost exclusively targeted players capable of instinctual positional fluidity) mix and match such mental profiles to create their ideal structures and shapes.

There’s so much that goes into football that simply making the ‘correct’ decision seems all too simple, but in reality it is the perfection that none can achieve but all strive for. Who knows, maybe Manchester City conduct IQ tests in their medicals?

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