Chapter 9. The Work of the Wingers

A few minutes after Billy Meredith had played his last game of football he was discovered by a friend, sitting in an out-of-the-way corner, looking dejected.

'Cheer up', said Bill's friend. 'After all, you have had a good run, and the end must come sooner or later'.

'It isn't so much that', said Meredith, with something like a tear in his eye. 'I wanted to play a bit longer because I have been learning a new trick, and I'd like a few more games in which to try it out'. It should be mentioned that the day of Meredith's retirement from the top-class game did not come until he was fifty years of age; the number of his International caps equaling his years.

He was, of course, an outside right, and between the lines of that little story of his swan song quite a lot can be read. It disposes, for instance, of the idea, which I know runs through the minds of many people, that the winger has one of the really easy jobs in football. Meredith wanted to stay longer in the game - after thirty years at the top of the tree - so that he could try out a new trick or two. That makes the point that there is always something new to be learnt even by an experienced winger. I was a winger, too. I didn't stay in the game as long as Billy Meredith, but I had the same sort of feeling when finally I packed away my football boots. Another point should also be noted - a consoling one. The wingers, generally speaking, last longer than the players in most other positions. In theory, and if they are clever enough, the wingers do not come into stern personal physical contact with opponents as do players in some other positions. They can dodge trouble. And as Stanley Matthews himself would probably say, in his quiet way: 'What's the use of growing old if you don't grow clever'.

The mention of Matthews (how difficult it is not to mention him in connection with wing play) also serves as a reminder that, easy as the winger's work is from some points of view, it is possible to earn real and lasting fame on the line. Matthews is still playing, still turning the other fellows dizzy; and he has played such a part in the game in our time that I haven't the slightest doubt that twenty years hence old-timers will still be talking about him. They will probably be asking then, why don't we produce a Stanley Matthews, or a Cliff Bastin?

By all means let the young players watch Stanley Matthews. Let them try to do some of the things he can do. It must be borne in mind, however, that all wingers can't hope to emulate Matthews. What is equally important is that they will not necessarily be dubbed failures if, in some directions, they don't even approach the Matthews heights.

Indeed, it might be said - I hope I shan't be misunderstood in saying this - that some of the wingers of to-day would render greater service to their sides if they weren't quite so keen to turn themselves into carbon copies of the one and only Stanley. Tom Finney, another great winger, has sometimes come in for criticism on the grounds that he has tried to do his stuff on the Matthews model, and has overdone it. That criticism, justified or not, has behind it the thought that Preston's Finney has not always 'got on with it' as quickly as the interests of his side called for. There is scope for variety in wingers, and scope for variation in their play.

It is merely natural, I suppose, that I should range myself on the side of the get-on-with-it wingers. This is an obsession with me because my success in football was due to what are called straightforward methods. As the game is played to-day, the wingers who cut out the frills can be of very real value to their sides. In another place I have explained the current tendency, in relation to general tactics, for the defenders to back-pedal towards their own goal when danger threatens. The wingers are the fellows who have it in their boots to carry the play into the enemy quarters at a good pace. Therefore it follows that if the winger dallies with the ball - unless he is a genius in beating opponents who are drawn to him - he gives the opposition enough time to fall back and cover the way to goal which the inside men have to take.

Often was it said of Arsenal that we stole goals, sneaked them against the run of the play, and won matches. It was true, too. A long clearance pass to an outside wing man - to Cliff Bastin or to myself - a quick run by the winger, a rapid cross to the centre-forward, and the ball was in the net. A four-kick goal, if you like.

I have known Alex James work backwards, towards his own goal, with the ball. The idea was to draw opposing players from their defensive positions, give them the idea that they had a chance to set up an attack. Battering at a packed goal is like kicking at a stone wall. There's no way through. So my advice to the average winger is: 'Get on with it: don't slow down the whole line'.

Thus we come to the part which speed can play in the work of the winger. Assuming that the play is kept open from his point of view, he will have opportunities for bursts of speed. When I was with the York City club, in my early days, I was slow, not quick off the mark, and not even fast when I had space in which to get going. In the effort to cure this fault, the trainer took me out even on dark evenings (we did a lot of our training in the dark) along with the fastest runner on the staff. I was given ten yards' start in a fifty-yards race, and the trainer had his flashlamp focused on the finishing mark. In due course, but not at once, I so cut down my running time, without the ball, that we two players were started for our race from 'scratch'.

After speed without the ball comes speed with the ball. This is really not so difficult to acquire. The winger who can go fast, make those sudden dangerous breakaways, can find opportunities for cutting in to score goals himself. Think of the matches which Billy Liddell has won for Liverpool by cutting inside, getting into such a position that, capable of hitting the ball hard with either foot, he has beaten the goalkeeper. The fast winger - no winger in fact - should consider it his job to wear the whitewash off the touch-line, with the corner-flag as his continual objective.

Possibly I am in danger of making the job appear simple. It does not always happen, in actual play, that the winger has plenty of space into which he can run with the ball unchallenged. That is why he has to learn tricks to beat the back, to dodge this way or that with the ball 'tied to his bootlace'. There are far too many wingers who can only go one way, outward, along the line. That is where his opponent wants him to go. So, even in this respect, the art of working the ball with both feet must be mastered.

Often the young player can only get practice on a rough piece of ground, very different from the smooth football pitch. Don't grumble about that. Indeed, Stanley Matthews himself has practiced - and I believe still does from time to time - all by himself on a stretch of uneven ground. It is a very good way of improving the art of ball control, with the ball having to be kept close and watched all the time lest it should break away, out of control. Another idea may be passed on which has the same object in view. Do some dribbling, if possible, with a rugby ball. Its shape will cause it to do the impossible. The fellow who can prevent a rugby ball doing the impossible - keeping it close and under control - will find the soccer ball much easier to tame.

There are other ways in which the winger can develop and improve his game in general, learn to do, by himself, all the things he will have to do in match play. Take half a dozen sticks - bottles standing on end will serve the same purpose-and place them four or five yards apart in a straight line. Take the ball, and work round those sticks - zigzagging in and out - from the first stick to the last. Turn round in the shortest possible distance and work back to the starting point. The closer the player keeps to the sticks, as he does the dodging run, the better. In due time, speed can be brought into it. I know of no better practice than this for a winger. Indeed, it is good for any player. The ball must be kept close to the feet, and not the least important thing about it is the development of the swerve.

All right! Our winger in the making has speed, ball control, tricks, and body swerve. There are other important qualities he needs, some of them on occasions when he has time to think first and act afterwards.

Corner-kicks, for example. These, as everybody knows, provide spectators with an excuse to get excited or anxious. Goals are visualized from these corner-kicks, but the hopes are not often fulfilled. Not so long ago there was a team which was good enough in general play to win a first-class championship. They did it without scoring a single goal immediately following a corner-kick until more than half the season had gone. Yet in the preceding months that side had been awarded dozens of corner-kicks. It goes almost without saying that when corner-kicks are taken the odds are on the defence. The defenders have merely to get the ball away, without undue concern as to where it goes, whereas the attackers must steer the ball into the comparatively small and well-guarded goal space. Granting this, it is none the less a fact that a big proportion of corner-kicks are wasted.

I am not at all sure that the law-makers, in changing the rules so that a goal could be scored direct from a corner-kick, did the game a real service. Wingers seemed to get the idea that it was worth while to make the attempt to score direct from the corner-flag. I don't need to be told that, from time to time even in first-class football, wingers do manage to get the ball into the net direct from the corner-flag. Regarding such goals, however, I am tempted to turn my back on the old tag which lays it down that the best shots are those which see the ball resting at the back of the net.

The plain fact is that the attempt to score goals direct from the flag doesn't pay. A ball from the flag so close to goal that it may swerve into the net is also close enough for the goalkeeper to get at it first. He is allowed to use his hands, a privilege which is not permitted to the attackers. Save when there is a strong wind to turn the ball inwards when the force of impact ceases to be effective, goals direct from the corner-flag come under the heading of flukes. The ideal to be aimed at, for the ordinary corner-kick, is that the ball shall come down, so far out from the goal mouth, that the goalkeeper can't advance to it without running a risk of not getting there before one of his opponents applies his head. A little way out, just opposite the far post - that's the hallmark of a good, if conventional, corner-kick.

Stand a few bottles in a straight line on the ground, three or four yards apart, dribble in and out around the bottles, keeping as close to them as possible and going as fast as possible. Also make the zigzag journey in the opposite direction. An alternative, but less complicated way, is to make use of a blank wall, kicking the ball against it at an angle, and taking it again on the return. The inside and outside of both feet should be used in these practices.

Fig 8

There is merit, too, in the corner-kick taken in such a way that the ball eventually swerves inwards. Outside rights who take corner-kicks on their side of the field with the left foot, and outside lefts who take theirs with the right foot, don't do it just to convince everybody concerned that they are two-footed. They do it to apply the inward curve. Sometimes, from the corner-flag, the winger should impart backward spin to the ball in such a way that, late in its flight, the ball seems to hang. I was never able to do this myself, but there are wingers who can do it, so there may be some knack which I never discovered. Once more bringing in Matthews, I have heard defenders say that he can do it at will, and also heard them add that this hanging ball is apt to deceive them.

A paragraph or two earlier I used the word conventional in relation to corner-kicks. That was done deliberately, because one of the reasons why such a small proportion of corners, taken even by accurate ball-kicking wingers, fail to produce goals is the fact that too many of them are of the casual copybook type: the orthodox lob into the middle. Let us have some more variety in corner-kick methods. Every team -junior or senior - puts on guard men in the penalty area to deal with these balls sent across from the flag. I have made the point that these defenders usually deal effectively with this sort of ball. By way of a change from the high lobbed ball, what about the ball sent crashing low among the players gathered near goal? That low ball across from the corner-flag isn't easy to deal with. Indeed, it can, and has, led to some of those tragedies of the game, when so-and-so put the ball through his own goal.

Again, by prior arrangement, the short corner-kick to a colleague who has taken up position, can also be used with advantage. The effect may well be to upset the covering plans of the defenders, get them moving from their 'set' positions. The same notion is behind another corner-kick dodge which is worth trying. As the winger moves to the ball placed in position near the corner-flag, the inside forward starts to run towards him, as if the two had entered into an arrangement by which the ball should be kicked short to the inside forward. It isn't, however. The winger lifts it into the middle - or a bit beyond. If, by running towards the taker of the kick, the inside forward has drawn a defender out of position - as he is likely to do - one desirable effect has been achieved. If nobody follows that inside forward, then the winger has just time to slip him the ball.

This variety of corner-kick merits a rather more detailed description, for it can bring definite results. The short ball is placed along the ground, quite near the goal-line, to a colleague. Often it is then passed back to the taker of the corner-kick, but that can be a waste of time. There is a better plan than that. Instead of passing the ball back, the forward who receives the short pass turns it, with one quick tap, to a wing-half who has taken up position. By this time the defenders are not so closely concentrated as they

Instead of the usual lob to approximately opposite the far post, the taker of the corner-kick makes a short pass to an inside man who has taken up position. The latter can then either shoot or make another short pass into the penalty area.

The best of the short corner-kick moves to open up the defence. As the ball is about to be kicked on the right an attacker - say, inside left - runs to a position near the goal-line. Getting the ball, he makes a first-time pass to the wing-half, then well placed for a shot.

Fig 9

were when the kick was taken, and the wing-half has an opening for a first-time shot. Try this method occasionally, but make sure it has rarity-value.

Corner-kicks, properly used, could be made, much more frequently than is the case, occasions for cheers, or tears. Brains should be put into them.

Up to now I have dwelt, in the main, on the things which the outside winger may be able to do when the play is on his own side of the field, or when he is actually in possession of the ball. At no time, however, should the winger consider himself completely out of the play. Certainly he should not consider himself out of it when his opposite wing partner has the ball. That is the time to take up position for the possible cross-pass. Among the moderns, Jimmy Mullen and Johnny Hancocks, Wolverhampton Wanderers' wingers, have demonstrated what can be done in this direction. When one of these two is in possession of the ball, working towards goal, the other comes in from the side-line, finding the open space, and is there to receive the cross-pass which has led to so many goals being scored by these Wolves wingers.

Nor should the modern winger be regarded solely as an attacker. Years ago, in a complaining mood, I said to Manager Herbert Chapman, after a particular game, that I had had scarcely a kick at the ball. He rounded on me, in his typical straightforward way, by telling me that, such being the case, the fault was mine, not that of anybody else. He told me I should have gone looking for it - chasing it. Maybe, in making that observation, the then manager of Arsenal was looking forward to a day which has now arrived, when the winger does go looking for the ball to a much greater extent than he did in other times. He comes back for it - to the half-way line or even well to his own half of the field - when his side's goal is being attacked. It is unlikely that there will be any opponent taking much notice of him in that isolated position. If it should happen, as it will from time to time, that a defensive colleague is able to clear the ball, he is likely to be able to send it to the waiting wing man, who can then start a reply raid, switching the scene of action, and bringing danger at full speed to the other goal.

It will happen, too, that the winger will either lose the ball to the full-back who tackles, or fail to pick up a pass because the opposing full-back intervenes. The winger worth his salt won't, on such occasions, stand there watching that full-back work the ball up the field. He'll chase him, worry him into making a hurried pass - or even surprise him by getting the ball as he is preparing to make his pass. Nor is it unknown, as a tactical move, for the winger of one side to be asked to play a part in holding up, or bothering, the winger of the other side if that player happens to be a particularly difficult customer. A thinking outside left will come back with a view to intercepting the passes meant for the star outside-right. The most effective method of preventing such a player as Stanley Matthews doing damage with the ball is to prevent the ball from reaching him. A wing opponent who comes back can often do this. Keep in the game, even if this necessitates, sometimes, wandering from the original position on the wing!

My conclusion is that wingers must be complete footballers. I have laid some emphasis on the manner in which they can work to make goals for themselves, but let me fall back on their paramount duty: which is the work they must do to provide scoring openings for the other fellows. There's no point in banging the ball at the goal from impossible angles. Indeed, and this is an axiom which wingers in general should keep in mind: Don't try a shot if there is a man on your side better placed.

The winger above all others who lingers in my memory is Alec Jackson. This Scot had everything it takes: speed, swerve, skill in both feet, plus a deadly shot. With these qualities he made for himself that extra split second in which he could look up for the player in position to use the ball. And that player was picked out with deadly accuracy. Blind centres are not good centres. They are usually gifts for the opposition.