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Calcio II: Catenaccio Reloaded


Deisler26

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“The perfect game of football would end in 0-0” - Gianni Brera

The Brief: The world of football has moved on inexorably. 2-3-5 gave way to 4-4-2 which gave rise to 4-5-1 which, in turn, gave rise to the current 4-3-3 that is in vogue. Now and then, you get coaches and teams appear with systems that break the mold or reinvent the wheel. Roles such as the trequarista, the false Number 9 have sprung up in order to make sense of the fast-changing tactical world of football. However, I propose to try to go back in time and try to take a Serie C2 side all the way up to Serie A, using the famous Catenaccio method designed by Karl Rappan and popularised by Inter's manager Helenio Herrera in the 1960's. I will attempt to play with a sweeper, but if none can play, I shall use a flat back system. I will also borrow from LLM, in that I will advertise ALL jobs for the club and only sign players I have scouted and/or trialled. Forza Italia!

The Goal: The goal is simple. Reach Serie A using the Catenaccio method. I will start as a young Italian manager who never got past the semi-pro stage. Once I reach Serie A, I will need to stay up for at least one season. Then I will consider my options. The ultimate goal overall is to win a Scudetto with Torino, in honour of the great side that was sadly lost to us. I will also try to keep the club as Italian as possible overall. Every time I'm sacked, I can only consider jobs at the same level or below in Italy.

The Setup: Austria, Belgium, England, France, Germany, Holland, Italy, Portugal, Spain & Sweden, all fully loaded with a large database

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scudetto_santarcangelo.jpg

Santarcangelo Calcio

Santarcangelo Calcio is an Italian association football club, based in Santarcangelo di Romagna, Emilia-Romagna. The club currently plays in Lega Pro Seconda Divisione (Serie C2). The ASD Santarcangelo sports association founded in 1926 is the most popular football in the area of Santarcangelo di Romagna as the team found a good following among local audiences who follows them fanatically. In the 2009/10 Serie D championship, Santarcangelo was placed in fifth position and the very next season, was promoted to Serie C2. The team plays in yellow and blue. These colours appear also in the badge. The team's symbol is the famous Cockerel of Romagna.

The stadium where the team plays home matches, is dedicated to the memory of Valentino Mazzola, the legendary Torino player killed in the Superga tragedy on 1949. Taking into account all sectors, the stadia has a capacity of 3000 seats; the size of the field are 65m x 105m.

stadio_mazzola.jpg

(information from Wikipedia)

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I won the Scudetto with Verona on 2010 after 18 seasons in charge using an entirely Italian born squad.

I only ever signed one non-Italian in my entire reign who was Croatian goalkeeper Matej Delac as there was a serious lack of decent Italian goalkeepers at the time and he filled the spot for years.

If I remember correctly though he finally moved on a few years before the triumph which also included winning the Coppa Italia for the first time during that same season.

Undoubtedly my finest season on FM.

---

Good luck with this, the Italian lower leagues are in my opinion the most fun on the game. Certainly beats the monotony of the English and the slog of the Brazilian.

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Fantastic! Old school Italian football is back! :D I've always loved the catenaccio way of playing and always try and pride myself on defensive shut outs when playing. Like Adelaidean, I've not got round to reading John Foot's book yet but hoping to soon.

This should be very interesting. Will be happy to follow this :thup:.

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This sounds awesome, I have a irrational thing for italian football. <3 What happens to your Leiria career though, giving up on it?

It's on hold at the minute, simply as I am having a lot of trouble trying to balance the team out

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Sounds great! Looking forward to this one! Pretty sure spending most of the 90s watching James Richardson on Football Italia has made me an Italian football fan for life. :thup:

My reasons too for loving Italian football. Man, I really wanted his job!

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Thanks for the support guys! I'm really looking forward to trying this and implementing some of the strategies involved. I've always loved good defences, my FM11 Leiria once conceded a paltry 7 goals in an entire season, but this will be an entirely new challenge!

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A (small) History of Catenaccio

Catenaccio, or to give it it's Italian pronuciation, Kate-nattshio is a tactical system in football with an emphasis on defence. In Italian, catenaccio means "door-bolt", meaning that there is a highly organized and effective backline which doesn't tend to leak many goals.

The system was made famous by the Franco-Argentine trainer Helenio Herrera of Internazionale in the 1960s who used it to grind out 1–0 wins over opponents in their league games.

The Catenaccio was influenced by the verrou (also "doorbolt/chain" in French) system invented by Austrian coach Karl Rappan. As coach of Switzerland in the 1930s and 1940s, Rappan played a defensive sweeper called the verrouilleur, who was highly defensive and was positioned just ahead of the goalkeeper. In the 1950s, Nereo Rocco's Padova pioneered the system in Italy where it would be used again by the Internazionale team of the early 1960s, the Il Grande Inter side.

Rappan's verrou system, proposed in 1932 when coach of Servette, was implemented with four fixed defenders, playing a strict man-to-man marking system, plus a playmaker in the middle of the field who played the ball together with two midfield wings.

Rocco's tactic, often referred to as the "real" Catenaccio, was shown first in 1947 with Triestina: the most common mode of operation was a 1-3-3-3 formation with a strictly defensive team approach. With catenaccio, Triestina finished the Serie A tournament in a surprising second place. Some variations include 1-4-4-1 and 1-4-3-2 formations.

220px-Catenaccio1.png

The key innovation of Catenaccio was the introduction of the role of a libero, or sweeper, a player positioned behind the line of three defenders. The sweeper's role was to recover loose balls, nullify the opponent's striker and double-mark when necessary. Another important innovation was the counter-attack, mainly based on long passes from the defence.

In Herrera's version in the 1960s, four man-marking defenders were tightly assigned to each opposing attacker while an extra sweeper would pick up any loose ball that escaped the coverage of the defenders. The emphasis of this system in Italian football spawned the rise of many top defenders such as Claudio Gentile and Gaetano Scirea in the 1970s, Giuseppe Bergomi and Franco Baresi in the 1980s, the famous all-Italian Milan defensive four of Baresi, Paolo Maldini, Alessandro Costacurta and Mauro Tassotti of the 1990's and 2006 World Cup winners Fabio Cannavaro and Alessandro Nesta and many others in 2000s for which the Italian national team would become famous for.

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So, basically my team must defend deep, have a sweeper and man-mark. We must also play on the counter with long passes. With another nod to the old Italian systems, I will use a Fantasisti/Mediano combination in the middle, this being a midfield playmaker and a 'water-carrier'. Looking at the above formation diagram, it'll be very hard to copy and transfer this into FM, so I will try a 1-3-3-3 formation.

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A (small) History of Catenaccio

Catenaccio, or to give it it's Italian pronuciation, Kate-nattshio is a tactical system in football with an emphasis on defence. In Italian, catenaccio means "door-bolt", meaning that there is a highly organized and effective backline which doesn't tend to leak many goals.

The system was made famous by the Franco-Argentine trainer Helenio Herrera of Internazionale in the 1960s who used it to grind out 1–0 wins over opponents in their league games.

The Catenaccio was influenced by the verrou (also "doorbolt/chain" in French) system invented by Austrian coach Karl Rappan. As coach of Switzerland in the 1930s and 1940s, Rappan played a defensive sweeper called the verrouilleur, who was highly defensive and was positioned just ahead of the goalkeeper. In the 1950s, Nereo Rocco's Padova pioneered the system in Italy where it would be used again by the Internazionale team of the early 1960s, the Il Grande Inter side.

Rappan's verrou system, proposed in 1932 when coach of Servette, was implemented with four fixed defenders, playing a strict man-to-man marking system, plus a playmaker in the middle of the field who played the ball together with two midfield wings.

Rocco's tactic, often referred to as the "real" Catenaccio, was shown first in 1947 with Triestina: the most common mode of operation was a 1-3-3-3 formation with a strictly defensive team approach. With catenaccio, Triestina finished the Serie A tournament in a surprising second place. Some variations include 1-4-4-1 and 1-4-3-2 formations.

220px-Catenaccio1.png

The key innovation of Catenaccio was the introduction of the role of a libero, or sweeper, a player positioned behind the line of three defenders. The sweeper's role was to recover loose balls, nullify the opponent's striker and double-mark when necessary. Another important innovation was the counter-attack, mainly based on long passes from the defence.

In Herrera's version in the 1960s, four man-marking defenders were tightly assigned to each opposing attacker while an extra sweeper would pick up any loose ball that escaped the coverage of the defenders. The emphasis of this system in Italian football spawned the rise of many top defenders such as Claudio Gentile and Gaetano Scirea in the 1970s, Giuseppe Bergomi and Franco Baresi in the 1980s, the famous all-Italian Milan defensive four of Baresi, Paolo Maldini, Alessandro Costacurta and Mauro Tassotti of the 1990's and 2006 World Cup winners Fabio Cannavaro and Alessandro Nesta and many others in 2000s for which the Italian national team would become famous for.

----------------------------------------------

So, basically my team must defend deep, have a sweeper and man-mark. We must also play on the counter with long passes. With another nod to the old Italian systems, I will use a Fantasisti/Mediano combination in the middle, this being a midfield playmaker and a 'water-carrier'. Looking at the above formation diagram, it'll be very hard to copy and transfer this into FM, so I will try a 1-3-3-3 formation.

Excellent! :thup:

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2011-12 Coppa Italia Lega Pro, Group H

-----------------------------

Renate

Rimini

Santarcangelo

San Marino

Sambonifacese

I'm really not expecting anything from this, in fact, finishing bottom won't phase me at all and the board just want us to enjoy the opportunity of participating. Clearly they have as much confidence as I...

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I applied to my board for a parent club. I was given a choice of the following; Modena, Juve Stabia, Hellas Verona and Reggina. All in Serie B, but I picked Reggina as they had an established youth network. Hopefully, I can take their youth and give them their first steps in football and improve myself at the same time.

I applied to the board for an increase in funds to the junior coaching and was denied it, along with an increase in the youth recruitment network. Gonna have to slog a bit, I see! I also sold a reserve defender for £7k which was good. There has been interest in my Fitness/Goalkeeping Coach roles and also the Ass Man role, but they either wanted too much or weren't good enough.

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My first game!

Santarcangelo Calcio 1 - 3 Portosummaga

Well, this was an expected defeat. Portosummaga are expected to be mid-table in C1/B and I've got to fight relegation in C2/A. However, their first two goals came from defensive assignment breakdowns which, once cured, didn't happen again. The third was a free-kick which was blocked by the wall, but then rammed in on the rebound. There was some sunshine late on, when a long ball out of defence set Ivan Graziani on his way down the right. He skipped past a defender and cut the ball back for Filippo Baldinini to side-foot home late on.

We played with this formation as a start of catenaccio

formation.jpg

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I know they broadcast some very random football stuff (J-League? U-17 women soccer?), but Eurosport are interested in the fourth tier of italian football now? :D

Beatrizzotti may have great mental and technical attributes, and mental attributes are key in this game, but I wouldn't trust him at all with those physicals. There is a bare minimum of physicals to be able to play football, even at that level. Hope I'm wrong, but I'd expect him to be a total flop.

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I know they broadcast some very random football stuff (J-League? U-17 women soccer?), but Eurosport are interested in the fourth tier of italian football now? :D

Beatrizzotti may have great mental and technical attributes, and mental attributes are key in this game, but I wouldn't trust him at all with those physicals. There is a bare minimum of physicals to be able to play football, even at that level. Hope I'm wrong, but I'd expect him to be a total flop.

I'm not a massive fan of his lack of physicals, however I think I can tutor him to 8-9 which will help overall. Obviously if he doesn't, I'll get shot, but you don't get that much quality down here.

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So, my first two competitive games..

Santarcangelo Calcio 1 - 0 Rimini (Coppa Italia Lega Pro, Group H)

This was a good game. I'd managed to pick up a wonderful striker on trial after seeing him in the Italian Trial Day and he murdered the first two friendly teams I played. So I broke the bank to offer him a contract, but he signed for Piacenza. Sigh. However, our unorthodox formation served us well in this match, Ivan Graziani netting the only goal with a snap shot from the edge of the area.

Santarcangelo Calcio 2 - 1 San Marino (Coppa Italia Lega Pro, Group H)

This game was brilliant. We were given no chance to win and went down early to a diving header from a cross, which'll be something to work on. However, Ivan Graziani netted a penalty after being hauled down in the area on 22 mins. Cosmo Bruno was playing in Paolo Beatrizzotti's spot, due to his fitness issues, but Paolo came on on 70 mins for a struggling Bruno. And it was his 90+4 min whipped free-kick from 40 yards that found sweeper-in-training Angelo Gregorio for him to bullet a header into the roof of the net.

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Santarcangelo Calcio 3 - 0 Sambonifacese (Coppa Italia Lega Pro, Group H)

This wasn't even a contest. Ivan Graziani netted the opener after good work down the left on 37 mins. Barely a minute after HT, he headed home from a deep free-kick to double our lead. Finally, on 90+1 mins, Claudio Cola headed home via the far post from a wickedly inswinging corner

That 3-0 win led to...

winner.jpg

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scudetto_santarcangelo.jpgSantarcangelo Calcio, September 2011 Review

Results

04.09.11

Santarcangelo Calcio 0 - 0 Mantova (Lega Pro Seconda Divisione C2)

A good start to the league season as we created little, but we defended well and our fledgling system seemed to hold up well against their attacks.

07.09.11

Santarcangelo Calcio 1 - 1 AS Renate (Coppa Italia Lega Pro, Group H)

We took the lead just after HT with a wonderfully judged looping header by Luca Riberto, one of the few signings I had actually made from a Beatrizzotti flick. However, they equalised ten minutes later, thanks to a horrifically unlucky deflection off our defender's heel, which fell invitingly for the Renate striker to slam home. We also lost Cosimo Bruno to strained knee ligaments for 8 weeks.

11.09.11

Santarcangelo Calcio 1 - 2 San Marino (Lega Pro Seconda Divisione C2)

San Marino got their own back on us in this league encounter as two defensive assignment lapses meant we were behind the gun at HT. Paolo Beatrizzotti netted a cute cutback from the edge of the box on 74 mins and we applied some late pressure, but nothing came of it.

18.09.11

Santarcangelo Calcio 0 - 0 Poggibonsi (Lega Pro Seconda Divisione C2)

A good tonic from the last game as we were strong and held up well, despite numerous attacks.

25.09.11

Santarcangelo Calcio 0 - 2 Cuneo (Lega Pro Seconda Divisione C2)

A horrible match, however, some small comfort was taken in that both goals conceded were defensive errors in that the first was a penalty after Davide Addona, another new signing, barged over the striker in the area. The second was a long, weak, hospital pass back from the centre circle by Beatrizzotti which was promptly seized on and scored..

28.09.11

Santarcangelo Calcio 2 - 0 Pro Patria (Lega Pro Seconda Divisione C2)

We bounced back well in this match with a few adjustments. Ivan Graziani netted the first, a cool finish from a long through-ball by Scarpa. Scarpa was again involved in the second as he was bundled over in the area by the defender and Alex Lodovisi netted the resulting penalty

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