Beyond The Goal

Bayern Munich have always been a replica of the mighty German national team. At present, out of the 32 registered players, there is a strong presence of 17 local players in the squad and, if you include their former coach Jupp Heynckes, you get a feel of an exclusive German team. As many of the household names in world football still get allured to the likes of Barcelona and Manchester United, Bayern always depend on home-grown players to form the core of the team. The result is the emergence of players like current skipper Philipp Lahm, vice-captain Bastian Schweinsteiger, Thomas Muller, Holger Badstuber, Diego Contento and Tony Kroos in the heart of the team. Their rising star David Alaba, though a non-German, is also a product of the club’s youth team. Bayern’s success has rubbed off on other German clubs who also have followed the Bavarian giants’ youth-based programmes. While other European clubs have marketed themselves across the world, Bayern have always focused on Germ...

The key to Rinus Michels’s Total Football concept was intelligent movement, understanding and fitness. It has been decades since the legendary Dutch coach re-invented and refined a system practised by his former boss Jack Reynolds at Ajax Amsterdam. Not surprisingly, the Dutch champions have retained the style and followed it with a sense of pride. Even Barcelona learned the nuances of total football from former Ajax man Johan Cruyff to lay the foundation of their own ‘tiki-taka’. FC Twente, lacking Ajax’s legacy and fame, teach ‘Totaalvoetbal’ to their aspiring players like all Dutch academies, according to Dennis Bekking, FC Twente’s Under-12 coach. “Total football is still widely followed by all clubs in the Netherlands. We don’t want even our goalkeepers to stand idle as we believe in mobility,” said 36-year-old Bekking. Ajax, the most famous club in the Netherlands, may not have been successful in recent European competitions. But, along with Feyenoord and PSV, they have s...