Benlucky's Blog

With the news that Ian Russell is Yallop’s assistant coach in San Jose, we can be even more assured that the style of play for the new Quakes will resemble that of the old. Russell displayed hustle and desire every minute on the field, flying up and down the wing. Even when it became apparent that he did not have the skills of a Brian Mullan, or even a Manny Lagos, we liked to cheer his effort in sprinting to the corner to hit a cross and then sprinting back to help on defense.

This sense of style is also reinforced by the expansion draft choices made by Yallop and Doyle. They concentrated on gritty defenders and hard-nosed central midfielder types to hold the middle, leaving the attack to the forwards, the outside midfielders, and to some extent the outside backs.

Can you say four-four-two, with the middle two of the middle four being cautious?