Special, what can u tell us about chelsea's new coach. i havan't seen enough ot porto to have a proper idea of what kind of coach vilas boas is.
does he have a preferred formation? what's his football? i gotta say i'm quite curious about this guy
i just realised he's only 3 years older than me
.... wich makes me suddenly feel very "average"
Hey Ben, nice to see you again my friend!
First of all, I must say that I'm a big fan of André Villas-Boas, not only because we share the first name
but mainly because he teaches his players a type of football I quite admire. I'm going to do (at least try to) a short report on Villas-Boas FC Porto tactic and footie style. Talking about reports, did you know that André used to write his notes on his Blackberry during the time he spent with Mourinho? Gosh, this guy is a perfectionist, he scouted everything he could and wrote complete and accurate notes in his phone!
After this short note I’m going to present you AVB preferred formation:
I brought this image from a Brazilian site to explain how works AVB 4-3-3 (I know that you can read a tactical board extraordinary well so my job may be not that important at all
)
Defense: This is the game when Porto won the Portuguese title at Estádio da Luz. As you can see André uses a traditional 4-3-3 concept. Starting with defense, AVB picked Fucile as a right back that time but Sapunaru used to be the number 1 in that spot. Both Fucile and Sapunaru aren’t especially good at the offensive department though. Alvaro Pereira has more attacking skills than any other LB or RB at Porto so many many times Otamendi was forced to compensate the left wing while Pereira was in the attacking path.
Midfield: Fernando has been transformed into a box-to-box during AVB time at Porto. While Jesualdo Ferreira used him as a simple MDF, André brought the player into the attacking department making the Brazilian a connection point between defense and attack. Guarin is an warrior in that midfield, a special warrior with good technical skills. João Moutinho is the man responsible to set the pace of the team, the main piece of this chess.
Offense: Falcao is the poacher of the team, the man who’s supposed to score, very different from Lisandro Lopez who was more a complete forward, looking for space around the field.
In the wings we have Hulk and Varela. If you play FM you would set them as Inside Forward, coming from the wings to the center and bringing support to the poacher in the middle. Hulk is the prototype of an inside forward. He takes all the action in the right wing since Sapunaru isn’t an offensive RB at all. He dribbles into the middle and uses his mid/long range shoot accuracy to cause the pain in opponents defense (oh that gifted left foot!). Varela isn’t a shooter at all, he prefers to cross or help Pereira incursions. However he scored some important goals imitating his Brazilain fella.
Game philosophy: After winning Europa League title André Villas-Boas surprised the World by thanking… Pep Guardiola! Why? He said Pep was the man that inspired him. In fact, both coaches are known for their tremendous offensive teams. What you could expect from AVB is an extraordinary attacking style of playing our loved game. Fast, strong and efficient: those are the key words, this is how you can describe AVB style of play. He is very different from Mourinho in this aspect, André is an offensive-minded coach.
Behavior: Some said Mourinho is arrogant, selfish, egocentric, ungentle, etc, etc. AVB won 28 from 30 league games. Two games ended 1-1: at Guimarães and at Alvalade (I was there by the way). What more do this games have in common? Well, André got ejected…
) and Anelka we'll still have a (hopefully) fit Torres, Sturridge who should be quite close to the starting XI after his Bolton loan and Lukaku who should be announced shortly after the new manager.
