Four Premier League title winners’ verdict on the lost art of defending

In this article, we look at four Premier League title winners’ verdict on the lost art of defending. Nigel Winterburn, Gary Pallister, Mikael Silvestre and Lauren have spoke with Betway about the changes in defending since they left the beautiful game.

Silvestre, who was a Manchester United player and top flight winner on four occasions between 2000 and 2007, gave his view on what it’s like being a defender at the highest level.

“If you switch off, you’re done,” he said. “You can’t rest like strikers or midfielders can.”

These days however, those in defence are expected to play a vital part in building attacks and keeping a high line so that their team can press.

Some like it, others don’t, with pundits often reflecting back and missing at just how football used to be back in their playing days.

Some of the debatable traditional skills of defending include ‘sticking your head where it hurts’ and ‘putting your body on the line’, though that’s something which has been diminishing over the last few seasons.

“When I played, you had to be an outstanding defender or you wouldn’t get into one of the top four teams,” ex-Arsenal left back Nigel Winterburn, who won three league titles at the club between 1987 and 2000, added.

“Now you don’t have to be as good defensively, but if you don’t have that quality on the ball then you probably wouldn’t get into a top team.”

When looking at the Premier League’s recent pass completion stats, we see an impact of a shift that requires defenders to have more technical ability than ever before.

At least one defender has ranked among the top three players for the highest pass completion rate in the last five seasons, and in 2020/21 campaign, John Stones, Ruben Dias and Thiago Silva made up the top three.

Given Man City’s style of play – who are 5/4 to retain the Premier League title in Betway’s latest football betting markets – have a defender present in all but one of the previous five. Take a look at the graphic below…

In Nigel Winterburn’s era, there are risks associated with playing out from the back were too high.

The 57-year-old spent eight years under manager George Graham, who was renowned for valuing defensive discipline in high demand.

“The way that teams are playing out from the back, modern defenders and full-backs have got be very comfortable on the ball because they’re often in advanced areas,” he says.

“But we were always judged by what we did defensively under George.

“Down my side I could go and play, but you knew that Lee [Dixon] would have to tuck round alongside the other two centre halves and vice versa if Lee went.

“Yes, we did play it out from the back at times when Arsene Wenger took over, but as soon as the goalkeeper got the ball, it’s up to the halfway line and you’d play from the knockdowns.

“I think the whole ethos of the game, particularly how quick it is, has changed.

“When I first started, the game was a lot slower. You think about the conditions, very rarely would you get a green pitch after Christmas.”

Another change we are seeing compared to that of a number of seasons ago is the pitches. The quality of them have quite a big role in a defenders’ ability to play out from defence.

Gary Pallister, who is another player who won four titles at the Red Devils – between the years 1992 and 1997 – felt rather comfortable in possession, but felt that he was hampered by poor playing conditions.

“A lot of the issues were to do with the pitches,” he said.

“If you look at the pitches I played on in the early part of my career, they looked like rugby pitches. Nowadays they’re like bowling greens and you can take more risks if you trust the pitch.”

Many would approve that the quality of pitches are in the best condition they have ever been, with modern-day training requiring the ball to be on the floor much more.

However it hasn’t always been like that, with the main priority being off-the-ball work and pragmatism on the training ground.

“I think if we were to go out and walk through some of the training sessions that George put on for our back four with a modern player, they might look at you in disbelief,” the former footballer continued.

“We used to go out a couple of times a week and it would just be the back four with the manager on the training pitch. There wouldn’t even be a goalkeeper and we wouldn’t have the ball on the floor.

“He would be jogging through positions that we would have to react to, imagining there was a piece of rope in between each player so the lines always stayed the same and you move in sync.”

“There was a lot more discipline involved compared to now.”

We have also seen a change in what is a ‘rough nature of challenges’ that defenders come up against.

Someone you may be surprised to learn that ‘false nine’ didn’t exist back in the 1990s, with teams instead more likely to line up with two strikers rather than one.

It meant defenders for the opposition were set to have a more tough physical impact every time they played a match.

“In the early part of my career you’d get a lot of centre forwards who were pretty robust,” says Pallister.

“You think about some of them – Mick Harford and John Fashanu, for example. It was the job of these guys to mess with the centre half and intimidate them.

“Physically, you’d have to be up to that kind of challenge, and it was something that I found hard when I first started in football because I was very slight.

“You got pushed around by some of these bigger guys and it’s something that I had to try and learn to deal with. That included weights and a maybe a few glasses of Guinness to try and beef myself up.”

Again however, the good old days allowed that, yet fast forward to the present, modern-day footballers wouldn’t be so fortunate in getting away without a card.

Ex-Arsenal right-back Lauren, who was originally signed as a midfielder in 2000, is more aware of how this wasn’t exactly an immediate shift, and that it took time for it to switch.

“I had to change my position and I had a few problems defending in the beginning, especially when the ball was on the other side I was caught ball-watching a lot,” he says.

“But now, they are asking defenders for more things. We have to re-adapt ourselves to the new era.”

Silvestre, who was known to be a player with huge recovery pace that would suit a team wanting to defend on the halfway line, reckons “it wouldn’t be a problem for me to play now”, and goes on to suggest it’s harder for defenders to flourish nowadays.

“The game is not in their favour,” he says. “Some people would go as far as saying the art of defending is gone.”

Lauren also gave his opinion on the matter, and thinks rather differently.

“Not everything from today’s game is fantastic,” he says. “But to be the best now, you have to combine the best of the most traditional skills and the best of the modern-day skills.

“Evolution is good.”