Great reply and thanks for answering my post. All I can say is in the The Numbers Game: Why Everything You Know About Football is Wrong by Anderson and Sally that is what they found after extensive research. There are quite a few quants working on football stats that blog frequently. If you like shall I post their twitter accounts up so people can follow all this. Have to say the anorak in me loves all this.
At present apart from general quants stuff interested in changing strategy at top clubs. This I find fascinating.
I tend to agree with your take on Stats and the benefits of defensive football etc. Then again, MW (and MB) know a bit about Statistical analysis in Football(!) and if Bees are adopting a more attacking strategy under MW than UR, I'm not going to argue with him.
I think a high tempo pressing style high up the pitch like Dortmund is the way forward. Regain the ball as near to the opponents goal as you can, get the ball into the box, preferably on the ground and take a shot. Guess bit like us at present!
Have to disagree, on two counts.
First of all, BFC don't play particularly high up the pitch like Dortmund. Bees' midfielders and forwards may press their opponents close when they (Bees) lose the ball, but the defensive trio of JD, Harlee and TC don't push up to constrict play in the middle third of the pitch. On the contrary, they're happy to drop back as far as the penalty area, with JD responsible for 'shielding' them up until then. Which is why BFC concede relatively few offsides, and when they do, they are relatively deep in their own half, rather than up by the half way line.
And the second is related to that. Personally, I don't feel any particular system is inherently "better" than the others (although a team adopting a new style may steal a march on the rest for a period eg Ramsey's 'Wingless Wonders"). For me, the key is adopting a style which best suits the players available (as eg Ramsey did, in the absence of top quality wingers).
Quite frankly, if you look at JD and Harlee, even arguably TC, none of them has the pace (esp) or the technique to take the ball forward to the opposition, for that risks their getting turned high up the field when possession is lost. In that sense, they are more comfortable defending on the 'back foot' than the 'front foot' (to borrow a cricketing term).
Which is also why BFC depend on building attacks by a combination of (a )McCormick and Bidwell bombing forward; (b ) JD/TC/HD giving the ball to Adam and George etc to build from around the centre circle; (c ) Button kicking long for Clayton; or (d ) defenders [Harlee esp] hitting long diagonal balls forward for front players.
And since under MW (and previously UR) the club seems to spend more time than most on assessing new players before signing them, so that they will fit into the preferred system, I think that a key reason for recent success.
