Grigor Pasha writes: The story has it that, just as Orpheus was about to emerge from Hades with his beloved Eurydice, he made the fatal error of turning to look backwards at her — causing her to disappear.
I think I committed a similar error with the previous blog post. The moment I decided to review our escape from the relegation zone, in Romania’s Liga 2, our run came to an end.
As a result, we arrived at the winter break on the back of three straight defeats. There was still some daylight between us and the drop zone, but the sarmale that we prepared for Christmas somehow didn’t taste as good as it might have done.
As has been explained elsewhere, an advantage of a winter break is that the sustained period of training and friendlies it provides an opportunity to introduce wholesale tactical change. So it was that we switched from 4-1-3-0-2 to 4-0-3-1-2.
In positional terms, the half back disappeared. to be replaced by that rarity in this league, a trequartista.
The outcome?
Disaster! The losing streak from before Christmas continued unabated. A cold coming we had of it, Just the worst time of the year.
With hindsight I recognise that I over-rated the squad’s capabilities. I think really that 4-0-3-1-2 requires an ability to dominate. We had neither the physicality nor the technical skills to be able to do that.
One blessing about winter, of course, is that, as Shelley had it, spring can hardly be far behind. (Really knew his seasons, that boy!) And spring brings renewal.
Time, evidently, for yet another tactical change.
Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;
Destroyer and Preserver; hear, O hear!
Image credit: ‘Orpheus’, generously made available by Mark Gallagher under a CC BY 2.0 licence.
