Role of Weather in English Football

by Lucifer Fri May 06, 2016 8:07 am

Read this interesting article about how weather in England affects style, technique and skill innfootball.

“One of the first things I had to get accustomed to as soon as I arrived in England was the weather. And I don’t mean the temperature or the rain but, most of all, the wind. The wind ruins everything. It forces you to do only one type of exercise. It forces you to work on either speed or continuous movement. It’s very rare that you get the chance to sit calmly and work on technique or on tactics. You have to keep the players moving, otherwise they get cold. And this is something which begins way back when they are children.”

– Arsene Wenger

“It’s all about the climate. I had a long discussion about it when I went to Scotland to see Andy Roxburgh. I worked with a Scottish youth side and had them do the same drills I would do in Italy. I realised that, between the wind, the rain and the cold, there was no way they could do it. How can you possibly teach anybody anything in those conditions? To me, it’s pretty obvious and it explains why Brazilians are more technical than Europeans and, in Italy, the further south you go the more technical they are.”

– Fabio Capello

“The English game is not faster than the German game. Perhaps there are a few more sprints. But there is a different style of football here, partially due to the weather,”

“The wind can be quite extreme in England. We are not familiar with that in Germany and you have to keep things simple. Stoke City’s first goal against Manchester United was a perfect example of the extreme winds. Players who are not from the UK have to get used to the winds.”

“I have to adapt my style of football as a result as well. Often, you are forced to keep things simple. And there are a lot more duels for the second ball here, and more duels in general. That makes the game even more intense.”

“The wind was crazy because it changed all the time. For both teams it was really difficult,”

“In this time you cannot take this game and say ‘This is how football should be’. Wind is the biggest enemy of football but we did okay.”

Jurgen Klopp, December 2015

So the writer is amatuer footballer himself and states how English football demand more of physicality than skills and technique
As a keen amateur footballer myself, I can testify to the magnificence of a Sunday morning spent trying to stand up and keep my concentration in the middle of a howling Force 8 wind (Force 12 is a hurricane…) on the Isles of Scilly, 28 miles off the coast of Cornwall, England.

"You can’t play football. Between the wind, the wind-chill that brings the temperature down to very low single figures, and the rain that slaps into your already-frozen face, it’s often left me feeling very deflated of a weekend. I think this is compounded by me being a ‘technical footballer’( ie I’m not quick) .When you turn up and the conditions are regularly atrocious, it tests your love for the game, especially when you feel like you’ve not enjoyed a second of it due to the game descending into the carnage that is British football as we know it."

On why there are less emphasis on technique in England as compared to others,

"But the more technical players often have to be hybrids of physicality and technical skill, and so we never quite see the emergence in Britain of smaller technical attacking players like Insigne, or Bernard, or Xavi, or Iniesta, or Silva, or Ozil, or Gotze etc. If you’re a dinky little technician you have to have a lot of pace to get away from the opposition in this country especially. So it’s no surprise to see Mahrez, Sanchez, De Bruyne, Payet, Hazard (when he can be bothered) excelling in the league usually, whereas Cazorla, Silva, Coutinho, Eriksen, Ozil do some things that can be fantastic, but overall there are many games where their impact on games is minimal."

On how this is affecting negatively on performances of English teams in Europe,

"When La Liga and the PL meet in the Champions League, it’s mostly the Spanish sides that come out on top against PL clubs because CL referees do not allow overly-physical players like Wanyama, Fellaini, Tettey, McClean, Milner, Noble, Colback, Dier, Coquelin, Brunt, Adam, Barry, Yacob, Matic, to thrive. I’m not saying they are bad players, at all, but their role in teams is often to ‘shut-down’ the opposition, and to do it through being very physical with their opposition’s most creative players."

You views.

by Myesyats Fri May 06, 2016 8:42 am

I think this article is BS.

There's also something like training behind closed doors, where the wind does not affect anything.

Such excuses.

by Lucifer Fri May 06, 2016 8:53 am

Training behind closed door is solution but not all youth academies have it hence the player are developed adjusting with environment. The author gives example of Gerrard,

Such training facilities are usually far superior to those of the youth teams in many cases, and amateur playing fields are usually in isolated, exposed areas where the wind and rain can take a run-up before it assaults you. So, to me, it’s little wonder that technical players are an endangered species in the UK, the weather makes them either totally ineffective for most games, and/or they don’t even get picked in sides as the manager puts more emphasis on players who ‘drive forward’ with the ball at their feet or are out-and-out pace merchants who can chase a long-ball behind a defence.

"Gerrard was a product of his environment, he could stand up in a gale and dominate a game through sheer willpower and physical strength with the ball at his feet. You wonder if he might have developed into more of a number 10 and been a better player had he been able to concentrate on playing that position in his youth development, but seldom is a number 10 position used in youth circles in the professional or amateur game."

by Adit Fri May 06, 2016 9:05 pm

Great read. That was fantastic... Always wondered why Englands average player is very less technically developed than Spain's average player for instance.

by breva Fri May 06, 2016 10:37 pm

Makes a lot of sense.

by sportsczy Fri May 06, 2016 10:47 pm

That's true in most sports... for example, the most and best athletes in the US are developed in California, Texas and Florida BY FAR. Just so happens these are the states that have the most sunshine.

On the flip side... a lot of best youth centers in France are in horrible places in terms of weather. Namely, Rennes, Nantes, Le Havre, Paris, Lyon. It's just as bad as the UK in these places.

Germany doesn't exactly have great weather either lol.

by breva Sat May 07, 2016 12:39 am

They were talking about the wind more than the temperature or precipitation.

by sportsczy Sat May 07, 2016 12:46 am

Anwhere in Northern France and Bretagne/Normandie = UK in terms of wind and everything else. Not to mention the winters are far more brutal. Ice and snow. You can't even play outside lol.

I just don't think the UK invests as much (or maybe not as smartly) as in France. Ligue 1 may suck... but the youth centers are how clubs survive here. They're the money makers by developing and selling players.