Journalism in Lower League Football

This blogpost has been in the brewing for a couple of months now. In fact ever since Mel Morris took the decision to relieve Paul Clement of his duties as Head Coach at Derby County I have been looking far more closely at the national media with regards to the reporting of football in the lower leagues.

The reaction of the national media to Clement's sacking was very much the same as most Derby fans; shock. What happened afterwards was very different though. As Mel Morris gave the reasons for his decision including the words "Derby Way" and "Promotion isn't the priority" everyone took stock trying to figure out what they meant. Derby fans; or at least a majority of Derby fans saw the reasoning and came to a similar conclusion that Morris had come to - harsh though it was, the sacking was for the greater good.

Paul Clement was sacked in February after the teams poor performances (Fabio De Paola)

The various news outlet of the national media reacted rather differently with many questioning the decision and openly stating that it would come back to bite us in the arse. As recently as yesterday, 3 months after the sacking, there were still pieces expressing confusion. This would suggest a distinct lack of detailed research into the topic. Anyone who had seen more than 5 matches prior to Clement's sacking could've seen exactly what most Derby fans have recognised since; a defensive-minded team relying on moments of magic to scrape out 1-0 victories. This simply isn't viable in the long term unless you have truly world class players.

The way football journalism tends to work is interesting when it comes to national newspapers. The big papers focus on the Premier League - why wouldn't they? That's what most of their audience wants to read about. Within this they tend to have reporters who cover specific areas; John Percy covers the Midlands for the Daily Telegraph, Louise Taylor covers the North-East for the Guardian etc. Even so most of these journalist converse about their areas with other football correspondents at their papers - or at least I would hope so!

It is a tough balancing act. There is a lot of football to cover; in the Midlands there could be 7 Midlands clubs in the Championship alone next season. I'm sure it's tough for one person (John Percy in this case) to stay abreast of all developments in these clubs. It would be very tough for them to be as knowledgeable as a fan of each club; to know not only the results,who scored and when, but also to know how good the performance was, what the positives and negatives of each performance were. Of course this would be expected for Premier League teams like Leicester City, West Bromwich Albion and Stoke City, but not for those in the lower leagues.

John Percy could have to cover 7 Championship teams next season. (telegraph.co.uk)

You would be far more suited looking to the local papers such as the Derby Telegraph for in-depth discussion (or in some case factual discussion) of lower league teams. Even though Derby are a big club* and are only one league below the Premier League some reporting left me clawing at my eyes. There was a lot stated in the press about how Derby were fifth in the league, only five points from the top of the league and saying how this was a decision based on wanting promotion at all costs. I've detailed rebuttals to all of this in a previous blog post. Respected journalists were coming out with this stuff, stating how it didn't make sense when Morris explained everything clearly and concisely.

* I am fully aware of how bad using the term 'big club' makes me sound. What I mean is that in terms of readership we would be a big club - over 23,000 season ticket holders and over one million people living in Derbyshire is not a small potential readership base.

This is beginning to sound like a rant. Next you know I'll be talking about some kind of anti-Derby conspiracy! However I know it's not only Derby who suffer from this. I was at an interview recently and I got talking to somebody there. This man is a Barnsley fan, born and bred. We were talking about Lee Johnson leaving Barnsley just outside the playoffs and going to Bristol City. The national press were talking about the great job that Johnson had done at Barnsley to get them that high in the league and I asked this man if he thought Barnsley would miss Johnson. I was a little surprised when he said no and that despite turning around their appalling start to the season they would cope well without him. I was a little skeptical but here we are at the end of the season and Barnsley are in the playoffs.

Lee Johnson left Barnsley for Bristol City in February.

In that same conversation this man mentioned that it appeared that Clement had been hard done by, to be sacked in fifth place and five points of top. I explained to him my point of view and we both came to a similar conclusion - there are things that the national press miss, especially when it comes to lower league football. You can't just look at the results of a team and automatically come to a conclusion about whether a sacking was the right one - you have to actually see the team in action for at least several matches, not just watch them on Sky if they happen to be on.


This is an unavoidable fact of supporting team not in the Premier League, you get less coverage in the media and that which you do get is of lower quality. From a journalists perspective I'm sure there is so much to cover that it's inevitable that some things get lost in the hustle and bustle of it all. That knowledge doesn't make me any less frustrated when the media comes out with ill-informed articles and uses this to back up arguments. 

The article that tipped me over the edge and contributed to the synthesis of this article was this one by Daniel Taylor in the Guardian. In his blog Mr Taylor talks about how sacking managers rarely makes sense and includes the sacking of Clement as one of his examples. Now, Daniel Taylor is an exceptional journalist (if you ignore the fact that he supports Forest), and I'm sure he is extremely well-versed in matters taking place in Manchester where he was based before becoming the papers Chief Football Writer.

It's worth noting Mr Taylor that despite what your piece implies, Clement was not sacked for our league position, he was sacked for dour football and a lack of integration of academy players into the main squad. Promotion is a secondary target this season, the main target was to built on the expansive football that Nigel Clough introduced and Steve McClaren took further and to that extent Darren Wassall has succeeded as far as he can in three months. I can accept people on opposition and online football forums being uninformed, but not top journalists who are supposed to know their stuff.

Another team mentioned in the article is Huddersfield Town. Huddersfield sacked Chris Powell when they 18th and finished the league in 19th position. On the face of it this adds to Taylor's argument, but Huddersfield's improvement since Powell's sacking on the pitch was remarkable. They went from a team that was poor away from home and struggling to score goals, to a team full of attacking verve who were lovely to watch. Improvement is not only measured by results and I'm sure if Mr Taylor had seen many of their matches since that sacking would've noticed that. 

A piece by Daniel Taylor was the inspiration for this piece/rant. (@DTguardian)

I'm going to finish what has definitely turned into a rant with an aside. Mr Taylor mentioned that Derby are now 11 points from the automatic promotion places - what would you make of Sheffield Wednesday then who are 3 points further behind us than at the time of the sacking, or Hull who are still only five points ahead of Derby at the end of the season. Hull were second in the league when Clement was sacked, yet no mention of Hull's poor performance in the second half of the season can be found in the national media.

Perhaps that's more of an indictment of the national media's general apathy towards lower league football in general. Lower league football doesn't sell views and readers like the Premier League does; is that because people are less interested? Is it because there is simply less quality journalism about it? Or maybe it's both - there's less reporting on the lower leagues, so less people read it? There are hundreds of enticing and riveting stories going on in the lower leagues and personally I think it's a shame that many don't get reported upon and that when they do, they are often reported poorly or to fit a larger narrative that they don't fit.

The Playoffs - Hull City

Continuing our trawl through the playoff contenders we meet Hull City. Hull, like Derby have been assured of a playoff place for the past couple of weeks, having only dropped out of the race for automatic promotion at the start of April. A 4-0 loss to Derby followed by a 2-2 draw against Huddersfield left them trailing behind the top three and they've been unable to make up the ground since.

Given the relative positions of Derby and Hull it is highly likely that these two teams will contest the 4th place vs 5th place playoff with Hull currently in pole position to gain the advantage of having the second leg played at the KC Stadium. Unlike in the previous article about the top three I think I'll go a bit more in depth for this one, so if I get anything wrong please feel free to correct me Hull fans.

Steve Bruce
Everybody knows Steve Bruce. The lovable Geordie who helped Alex Ferguson win his first Premier League title as a player and subsequently gave him 6 points every season as a manager. Currently in his fourth season at the club, there can be no doubt that he is an effective championship manager; a second straight promotion push for his second season in the championship makes sure of that. However, there have been murmurs of discontent among the fans since their disintegration against Arsenal in the 2013/2014 FA Cup final - doubts about his ability to spot flair players and more importantly, integrate them into the starting eleven remain.

Steve Bruce is not universally loved in Hull (PA)

One perfect example of this is Tom Ince. Signing for Hull on a free transfer after his contract with Blackpool expired, the signs looked good. To have rejected Inter Milan - so his dad would have you believe - in favour of regular playing time in England is a move that should be applauded. Things quickly fell apart for Tom once the regular season started though, being played as one of the front two in Bruce's 3-5-2 formation. This was a baffling decision from an experienced manager - why play a man who made his name as a left winger given the freedom to express himself as a striker who has to hold the ball up and chase down lost causes?

Either Bruce didn't watch Ince before bringing him in which is worrying in itself, or even worse he saw him and played him in that position anyway. After three starts and a handful of substitute appearances Ince was done at Hull, sent on loan to Nottingham Forest where he struggled in Stuart Pearce's free falling side before eventually winding up at Steve McClaren's free falling Derby. The poor guy couldn't catch a break last season but he still performed well enough on loan for Derby to buy him out of his contract at Hull in July, against Bruce's will.

Formation
This season Bruce has dropped his 3-5-2 formation and has been swapping between 4-4-2 and 4-4-1-1 as seen below. In the premier league Bruce relied on to aggressive wing backs to track up and down the side of the pitch - Robbie Brady and Ahmed Elmohamady. However, with the sale of Brady to Norwich City in the summer and the recruitment of the more orthodox Moses Odubajo a change of formation was required. 

Hull's formation has swung between 4-4-2 and 4-4-1-1 this season. Players chosen by best rated player in position in that formation, not the most appearances.

The above formations can both be very telling and misleading at the same time. For example, even though he doesn't appear in any of the above formations Tom Huddlestone has made more starting appearances than David Meyler this season, a discrepancy most likely due to Meyler's injury problems this season (or maybe Meyler's just been really inconsistent? Hull fans, let me know which one it is). Robert Snodgrass' inclusion should be surprising given his late return this season after injury, but it shows that since his return Elmohamady has been pushed out of the side and 4-4-1-1 has been the formation of choice for the Tigers. One other thing to be noted is that centre backs Harry Maguire and Alex Bruce have made 26 starts between them this season, perhaps indicating an unsettled partnership in central defence. Other than that though, as can be seen above there has been a fairly consistent starting eleven for Hull this season.

On the Pitch
A couple of weeks ago I mentioned Derby's 4-0 drubbing of Hull in one of my posts. While I didn't go very in depth as to why that happened I feel I should return to it; Hull will most likely be Derby's opponents in the playoffs so we should attempt to learn everything we can about how they play. With a 6-0 aggregate score (2-0 away, 4-0 home) over the two matches the teams have played this season, to the casual viewer it would appear that we already have their number.

Hull's starting eleven vs Derby (05/11/15)

In the game at the KC Stadium Bruce went for a bizarre 4-3-3 formation looking to match up to us man for man. With first choice left back Andrew Robertson injured, Odubajo was shifted to left back and Elmohamady to right back and Harry Maguire filled in for the injured Michael Dawson.

Now forget everything I have just said and look at that team sheet to the left. Does that look like a team with everybody playing in their natural positions:
Mohamed Diame - a central midfielder playing as a winger.
Shaun Maloney - a central attacking midfielder playing as a winger.
Sam Clucas - a left sided utility player in central midfield.
Odubajo - A right back playing at left back.
Huddlestone - A defensive midfielder pushed up into central midfield.

That's at least five players being played out of position - I'll direct you to the section above talking about Bruce playing players out of position.  Hull went on to dominate possession in that match and carve out several good opportunities against Paul Clement's defensive, counter-attacking Derby side. Looking back on it, a draw would've been a fair result and a draw would've been the result if Carson hadn't pulled off some heroics. Still, I wouldn't place to much stock in gleaning potential future results from this fixture - Hull had several key players injured and Derby were being managed by a man who would later be sacked for playing the wrong brand of football. A better comparison might be the meeting between the two sides in April.

Hull's starting eleven vs Derby (02/04/16)

 For this match Hull set up in a much more familiar 4-4-1-1 formation with Huddlestone and Livermore anchoring the midfield. This seemed like a much more balanced Hull side with as far as I can tell only Diame playing slightly out of position. We all know what happened next - Derby thumped them like an abusive playground bully, only our fists were actually good passing moves. Why did this happen?

The most important thing to note is how the attacking two - Diame and Sone Aluko were on a completely different page from the rest of team. I can only assume that they were doing exactly what Bruce told them to do, they harried the Derby backline, putting pressure on the ball as a pair. This is a good idea; as we all know, Jason Shackell is not the greatest on the ball and Keogh has a (somewhat unfair) reputation for choking when put under pressure.

The problem is that Huddlestone and Livermore either couldn't or wouldn't move up to help press, meaning all Shackell and Keogh had to do was play a 5 yard pass to the centre circle where George Thorne was waiting. At this point Huddlestone and Livermore would realise the danger and try to push out, but it was too late by then; Thorne in turn only had to play a 10 yard pass to one of Craig Bryson or Bradley Johnson who would be free to run at Davies and Dawson.

Now I'm about to do something I've done rarely this season - praise Jason Shackell. I have criticised him time and time again this season for dwelling on the ball too often and refusing to pass to anyone other than Keogh. Against Hull he surprised me. When Livermore and Huddlestone moved out to help the front two press Shackell would simply caress the ball into Chris Martin at chest height. Martin saw the space vacated by the two central midfielders and dropped in away from the Davies and Dawson who were unwilling to move out of position. With no midfielders crowding around him Martin was able to hold the ball up and bring the midfield into play.

This seems to be a case of Bruce getting the front two wrong. The very slow midfield pairing of Huddlestone and Livermore would have coped perfectly well against Derby if the entire team had been told to drop in and play on the break, but Aluko and Diame seemed to have other ideas. To be fair to Bruce there is a distinct lack of pace available to be able to do this - Snodgrass is pretty slow for a winger and Clucas isn't the fastest. Hull did improve when bringing top scorer Abel Hernandez and the tricky Shaun Maloney off the bench.

From what I can tell I suspect Bruce was hoping for Livermore and Huddlestone to outmuscle the Derby midfield, but Thorne and Johnson were more than a match for them, while the effervescent Bryson buzzed around them. A lesson learned for Bruce perhaps? I wonder if Bruce had been braver and started Hernandez if the game and result might have been different - he presents a different kind of challenge for defenders than the terrier-like work rate of Aluko.

Tom Huddlestone and Jake Livermore were comfortably outmanoeuvred at the iPro.

How will Hull play against us in the playoffs?
Since the defeat to Derby Hull have tended to start with a 4-4-2 formation, with Hernandez partnering Adama Diomande more often than not. Bruce and Maguire have also started several games as have Akpom and Maloney. Either Bruce decided to start rotating his squad quite early, he's had injury problems or he still cannot decide on his best eleven more than 40 games into the season. Just an idle observation - I noticed that against Huddersfield Snodgrass was played as one of the strikers in a 3-5-2 formation. Where does that sound familiar, a winger being played as a striker?

It seems there is no point in trying to determine what Bruce will go with as his starting eleven vs Derby. It will most likely be similar to what we saw at the iPro, with Hernandez coming in to lead the line and perhaps Maloney replacing Diame. If Bruce is smart in the away game at the iPro he will get his team to sit back and try to hit Derby on the break; countless teams have done that this season and Derby rarely cope well with it. Still, Bruce needs to drop one of Livermore or Huddlestone for a more mobile central midfielder, one who can contribute offensively and defensively; they are both too similar at the moment.

Whatever team Bruce selects, I would expect Derby to press high up the pitch like they have tended to do since Darren Wassall took over. Dawson and Davies aren't the most comfortable with the ball at their feet and in both post-match interviews this season Bruce has remarked how his team have made a lot more mistakes than usual during the match. I wonder if this is due to Derby's ability to press high up the pitch which doesn't normally happen against Hull.

Despite everything that Derby have done right against Hull so far this season, Hull are still a remarkably tough nut to crack - they've only conceded 34 goals this season (the second lowest in the league). In fact if they hadn't conceded those six goals against us they would have the best record in the league. They also have the third best disciplinary record - it's worth mentioning that Derby have the fourth best.

Darren Wassall will need to find a way past Bruce's resolute Hull side

Final Thoughts
The playoffs are a completely different ballgame to the regular season. Both teams will be up for it, but both will also know the consequences should they mess up. The matches will most likely be tight affairs either settled by one moment of magic or by a colossal f*** up. If Derby do play Hull I suspect we might just have too much for them - with our first choice midfield finally reaching fitness and a manager finally learning to put players in their natural positions there's no reason to fear them.
Hull will most likely feel the same way - they have players who are more than capable of destroying teams on their day, it's just a case of if their manager is good enough to get them to do so.