Gang of Four: Great Defensive Units

Image from The Offside – AC Milan

So the logic goes, goals bring in fans but defenses win championships.

Soccer is no different; even with the fearsome strike corps United had last season in Ronaldo/Rooney/Tevez/Berbatov (alright, so strike the last one), it was that backline that did the real heavy lifting. Something about 11,485 clean sheets in a row or something.

Well today, we salute a quartet of quartets that did nothing but strike fear into their opponents, stopping them strike in the process.

Note: I kept out international teams simply because of their obvious advantage over club teams: the ability to cull players from anywhere and everywhere. And so, France’s 1998 backline, Greece’s 2004 effort and West Germany’s defense of the early 1970s are nowhere to be found. Also, the list is rather England-centric, but that’s my prerogative.

AC Milan, late-80s/early 90s - Paolo Maldini, Franco Baresi, Alessandro Costacurta, Mauro Tassotti
We know all about catenaccio from our rigorous soccer studies; Italians (by way of an Austrian who taught an Argentine) learn to compress the middle of the pitch with tight man-marking and a rigid back four, win a slew of games 1-0, lather, rinse, repeat. Despite it becoming famous in the ’60s with Inter Milan, it was the Rossonieri who took things to the next level some two decades later.

The first signature of Meeelan’s defense was its unbelievable longevity. That backline above amassed nearly 3,000 appearances in the red-and-black, giving the team continuity and stability for well over a decade. Each had their defined role; Maldini (902 appearances) was the group’s flair performer, Baresi (719 appearances) the gruff custodian, Costacurta (663 appearances) the good cop, and Mauro Tassotti (583 appearances) the card-accumulating devil in a right-back’s clothing (infamous for his elbow on Luis Enrique at USA ’94 that left the Spaniard reportedly missing a pint of blood).

Catenaccio is Italian, and this long-standing quartet made it their bible, reciting it chapter and verse weekly against all comers.

Manchester United, 1992/93 – Denis Irwin, Gary Pallister, Steve Bruce, Gary Neville
When your club is coming off a nearly 25-year trophy-less run in England’s top division, how might one look to build a team that would sweep the inaugural Premier League trophy into Old Trafford’s cabinet and amass five more titles before the decade’s end?

You’d probably begin at the back, and Alex Ferguson, who so easily and so famously faced the axe in 1990 before that FA Cup win, thought the same thing. Center-backs Bruce and Pallister, notably dour in demeanor and approach to their job, and fullback Denis Irwin had been on the Reds’ books for a couple of seasons, but once Gary Neville, one of the most loathed United players on Merseyside, joined the fray in 1992, things looked complete.

The quartet conceded a league-low 31 goals in 42 games that year when all around them were leaking goals and ground to the runaway champs. Villa were 10 points behind by season’s end, and although Arsenal had an equally stingy backline (allowing just 37 in 42), they finished 10th by virtue of drawing nearly a 1/4 of their games.

United looked to their defenders for stability, leadership, and the occasional goal (between them, 75 goals in nearly 1400 appearances) from the set piece. Today, United are just as strong at the back thanks to this all-English/Irish prototype that dominated the 1990s.

Arsenal, 2003/04 – Ashley Cole, Sol Campbell, Kolo Toure, Lauren Bisan-Etame
You have to give credit to the first-choice back-line of a team that went undefeated, don’t you? I mean, what more can you ask of your defenders? What made this collective different was their mobility and skill on the ball, a nice change of pace to the dullards and lunks that traditionally serve as the last obstacle en route to goal.

Ashley Cole and Lauren were the EPL’s first true set of attacking full-backs, a weapon the game could barely live without these days. In Campbell and Toure were flawed heroes, each capable of the occasional gaffe yet they never suffered a bad day at the office at the same time. Toure in particular, a nobody plucked from Ivorian minnows ASEC Mimosas at age 21 for just 150,000 pounds in 2002, was a revelation, thriving as a center-back with ball skill who served as a wonderful foil for Campbell’s brute strength.

Ageless irritant Martin Keown stuck around to mentor the collective and provide veteran guidance from the bench, but they didn’t much need it. Pace, power, mental toughness (think: the resolute comeback from 2-1 down to win 4-2 against a Liverpool side very much up for it at Highbury), and a verve that permeated the team from top to bottom.

Ajax, 1972/73 – Wim Suurbier, Barry Hulshoff, Horst Blankenburg, Ruud Krol
Before the band broke up, there was time for one final encore, and the ’72/’73 incarnation of these Dutch masters was perhaps their finest hour. Though they missed out on the treble again, they settled for a runaway success in the Eredivisie and a comprehensive sweep through the European Cup before trouncing Juventus (a team containing future England manager Fabio Capello in the midfield) 3-1 in the final. Known as “The Twelve Apostles” for their unbroken XI and regular super sub, Ajax were transcendent. That is, until Johan Cruyff headed for Spain and the club underwhelmed for the rest of the decade.

They were notable for their refinement of the Total Football style that would eventually dazzle on the world stage in 1974. All four of the Amsterdam back-line ended up at the World Cup and played pivotal roles in the nation’s success, as did most of their first XI. Krol was the long-range threat, capable of moving upfield and scoring (witness the 25-yard rocket against Argentina in WC ’74 at 3:21), wing-backs Suurbier and Hulshoff were forever foraging forward down the flanks — the team’s fluid 4-2-4 formation, first endorsed by Brazil at the 1958 World Cup, demanded versatility from wide defenders moving into midfield, forward and back — while center-back/sweeper and German(!) Horst Blankenburg (or his occasional understudy, Velibor Vasovic) possessed better ball control in the dribble than most of the team. It was he that controlled the keys to Ajax’s offside trap, one he ran with inhuman precision.

It would be several years before Ajax could field a team even close to matching their Gloria Ajax years, and yet their 80s largesse with Rijkaard, van Basten and Jesper Olsen, or even their 90s renaissance with Kluivert, Michael Laudrup, the de Boer brothers and Edgar Davids, never surpassed that first glorious class of the early 1970s.