John Stones: The last libero or first of a new breed?

MANCHESTER, ENGLAND - OCTOBER 21: John Stones of Manchester City claps the fans after winning the Premier League match between Manchester City and Burnley at Etihad Stadium on October 21, 2017 in Manchester, England. (Photo by Alex Livesey/Getty Images)
MANCHESTER, ENGLAND - OCTOBER 21: John Stones of Manchester City claps the fans after winning the Premier League match between Manchester City and Burnley at Etihad Stadium on October 21, 2017 in Manchester, England. (Photo by Alex Livesey/Getty Images) /
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Predominantly in European football until the late 1980s there was a back three of defenders.

Two defenders would be traditional centre backs and the third would be a libero- a free sweeper with a licence to roam and mop up attacks.

Arigo Sacci is generally credited with making tactical adaptations to his Italian side which moved the free role forward and into a more recognisable modern defensive midfielder.

The death of the libero saw the rise of contact marking and pure zonal systems of defending. When I think back to the great libero of times past I think of the old battleship himself, Franz Beckenbauer.

A remarkable and disciplined player with a range of passing skill, vision and poise. These days of course we also tend to associate him with corruption and a fierce dogged determination to protect what he perceives as German national interests, like Bayern Munich. Anyway, I digress.

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John Stones was signed by Pep Guardiola precisely because he seemed to have a skill set equivalent to the great European ball playing centre backs.

These romantic notions of defending run through the ideals espoused by Guardiola and it’s not hard to see why Manchester City also purchased Aymeric Laporte in January 2018. The Frenchman offers a similar skill set to Stones but if anything, appears a little less polished at times.

Whilst Guardiola has so far deployed both Stones and Laporte as traditional centre halves, 2018/19 offers a couple of opportunities for Guardiola to tweak his tactical approach during games which may make our play more interesting and will certainly keep our opponents on the back foot. To be fair they are still coping with inverse full backs.

The failure to sign Guardiola’s preferred defensive midfield cover of Jorginho has created an opportunity for 3 different players to undertake this role within Guardiola’s existing system.

Ilkay Gundogan covered for Fernandinho a few times last season and brought a range of quick passing to the role. Fabian Delph spent most of the season as an improvised left back but has the skill and positional sense necessary to deputise in this role.

He has shown he is disciplined enough to sit deep and I think he would be an interesting experiment.

Finally there is the prospect of our last libero, John Stones. Stones has the positional sense and range of passing but would need some coaching to prevent him naturally sitting too deep and potentially inviting attacks.

Stones, though, due to his abilities as a libero also affords another tactical solution to Guardiola for 2018/19.

Breaking down teams who sit deep and attempt to offer only limited counter attacking options has been a puzzle faced by Guardiola throughout the record breaking season. Whilst it could be argued City did well against tightly massed 5-4-1 defensive formations, it’s probably fair to remark there was an element of luck involved in some of our last minute winners against these teams.

Expecting similar approaches from a variety of sides in the Premier League for the new season means Guardiola and his staff have been looking for innovative solutions to deploy against massed defences.

Leaving Walker and Laporte in a back two, allowing Stones to step up into midfield during a game as a defensive midfielder, allows KDB to assume forward duties, spraying passes for the swarming attack to run onto.

In this tactical evolution Stones takes the role of libero, a step further forward, and his duties become akin to the fullback in American football, just protecting the quarterback and buying him the time to make the pass.

It’s similar in basketball as the shooting guard protect the shooter to allow him space for the final attack.

The second tactical option of Stones moving into a defensive midfield during a game is the ability to create overload against the opposition. Stones acting as defensive cover allows Fernandinho to move position either to create an overload against oppositon on the wings or through the middle with Silva and KDB.

From the overload position the Guardiola tactic is to switch play to the opposite wing, releasing the attacking runners to open the defence such as Sterling and Sane.

The decision not to recruit any further players provides a series of interchangeable tactical options to utilise in game against opposition, depending upon how they set up and play.

Crucially none of these options are easily spotted from a team sheet consisting of the same players who have tactical fluidity.

This is a nightmare for the opposition manager who has to work out how we are playing and then seek to counteract it, but of course by that time we will have used the players differently yet again.

This is the main innovation I expect to see in Guardiola’s team in his third season at City. Speedy fluid systems deployed dynamically during the game.

If we see this, as I hope, then we will potentially see Stones emerge from playing a libero role, through a defensive midfield role and evolving into a new free role – which may well come to characterise Guardiola’s Manchester City.

Stones, the player Guardiola most wanted, may well develop into the most important player around whom the new system is built.

Next. Which striker will Guardiola start with?. dark

Will Stones be central to potential new tactics?