Football was now a truly global, visible sport as the 1970s had proven, and the World Cup
its most significant event both in terms of prestige and viewing figures.
However, while the first six World Cups saw an average of 4.28 goals
per game, peaking in Switzerland in 1954 with 5.38, the 1960s onwards saw a general trend
of decline that reached its lowest ebb in Italia ’90, where a paltry 2.21 goals per game were scored.
Defence was king as the free-scoring ‘50s receded from view, but Spain ’82
did provide some respite from the doldrums.
Brazil continued their evolution towards becoming
every neutral’s favourite team by deploying what came to be known as the magic
square : deep-lying playmakers Falcao and Cerezo played behind attacking midfielders
Socrates and Zico.
Ahead, Serginho was a brutishly physical centre-forward who dragged markers around, while
Eder had a licence to drift into wide spaces, supplemented by one or both of the attacking midfielders.
Width came from energetic full-backs, as was
customary with Brazilian teams, and the enormous movement, slick triangular passing,
and space created by Serginho meant that Brazil played with fluency and flair.
Nonetheless, they couldn’t progress from
Group C in 1982, denied by eventual champions Italy in what Jonathan Wilson says was “probably”
the greatest World Cup game ever; they did, however, beat Argentina in a tempestuous affair.
Italy were still shackled to some form of catenaccio though Enzo Bearzot , like previous
Italian managers before him, had tried to shift away
from a style of pure contain and break by injecting more creativity.
Gaetano Scirea, a converted
midfielder, played as a genuine libero , stepping up into midfield and operating as
a playmaker from the back; the elegant and thoroughly modern Juevntus and Italy captain
never received a red card in his career.
The two centre-backs, Claudio Gentile and
Fulvio Collovati, were very much in the traditional Italian stopper mode though and, with sitting
midfielder Gabriele Oriali, provided a screen that allowed Scirea to drift forwards, Antonio
Cabrini to get forwards from left-back, and Bruno Conti to shuttle up and down the right flank.
Though Italy played with two nominal centre-forwards,
Paolo Rossi was a pure predator who stayed close to goal, with support acts Francesco
Graziani or Alessandro Altobelli much more inclined to drop off or pull wide, much as
Eder did for Brazil.
It was a form of catenaccio , though with
a skilful sweeper like Scirea, a truly world class midfielder in Marco Tardelli , and Rossi up front, this was not quite the dour, lumpen Italy of old.
West Germany also played with a sweeper, in what could be seen as a 3-5-2 or 5-3-2.
Wolfgang Dremmler and Paul Breitner sat in midfield, while Felix Magath or Karl-Heinz
​Rummenigge played as an attacking midfielder,
joined by Pierre Littbarksi dropping from centre-forward.
Manfred Kaltz and Hans-Peter Briegel were
full-backs but who had to get forwards to provide width, at least in the midfield areas,
though again the outlook from the West Germans were generally to stifle and wait
for the attacking trio to produce something.
It wasn’t enough in the final, though, as Italy
beat the West Germans 3-1, Breitner’s goal a consolation with seven minutes to go.
Stifle and wait: this became something of a theme in 1986 and 1990.
When the magic square cannot even get out of the group stages,
then it does suggest that defence should have primacy over attack, tactically if not aesthetically.
However, as Carlos Bilardo , the boss of Argentina found in 1986, sometimes you
have to adjust because of one player; in this case, Bilardo had Diego Maradona . How does
one create a system that works defensively but
incorporates the mercurial genius of Maradona?
Bilardo’s answer was to create a genuine 3-5-2.
By pushing the full-backs up to become wide
midfielders, playing a sweeper who was less creative, and allowing Maradona to roam and
Jorge Burruchaga to get forwards from midfield, covered by Sergio Batista, Bilardo
created a system that pressured the sides playing
a more defensive 5-3-2 system or overmanned those using a traditional back four.
As wingers became less fashionable, and teams
created width only from deep on the pitch through full-backs, Bilardo recognised that
making full-backs into midfielders ate up all the
space into which the opposition wide men could run, putting them immediately on the back foot.
And in the middle of this system, Maradona:
the diminutive genius could essentially do what
he wanted where he wanted, free to play as a second striker or attacking midfielder,
central or wide, behind a hard-working striker in
Jorge Valdano and seven runners who would cover
his absence from the defensive shape.
West Germany, who were to be beaten finalists again in 1986, played a form of lop-sided
5-3-2 that was, in effect, a form of 4-3-3 with the fourth defender a libero.
This style, borrowed from the Ajax of a decade earlier, was favoured by manager Franz
Beckenbauer because he himself was a fine sweeper.
The back three man-marked with the libero the free man to push up and make a
3-4-3, while one of the front three, or two, dropped off into the hole to make what was,
in effect, a 3-4-1-2 in possession, and a 4-3-2-1 out of possession.
The final saw a 3-2 win for Argentina as they
pinned back the West Germans, took advantage of their lack of natural width,
and used Maradona to tie up several markers at a time.
The defeat meant that Beckenbauer had lost the World Cup final as both a player and manager.
The World Cup was Maradona’s.
The roles were reversed in 1990, as West Germany beat Argent ina 1-0 in the final.
West Germany, with Rudi Voller and Jurgen
Klinsmann playing ahead of a deep-lying playmaker Lothar Matthaus supported by creative
attacking midfielders Thomas Hassler and Pierre Littbarksi, who had been a striker
in 1982, should have been an attacking whirlwind but the focus was now very much on system,
hard-running, and only allowing a few players the genuine freedom to roam from position.
3-5-2 was the norm, used even by England; the Three Lions featured Paul Gascoigne , David
Platt, and Chris Waddle and played with more freedom than most sides at the tournament.
But physicality and closing of space, as encouraged
by the 3-5-2 revolution, stifled much of the joie de vivre that football had experienced
in the 1970s and before.
Great players could still shine, like Rossi in 1982 or Maradona
in 1986, but the system was king and defenders had primacy.
It would take yet more tactical change to enliven football again, but never
again would teams play with quite the same abandon as Brazil in 1982.