The Welsh Way: Socialist Football for the 21st Century
Image: Andrew Dowling Photography
Sam Southall
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Part One: Socialist Football
If there's two things that us Cymry love then it's football and socialism. It’s a match made in heaven – a collective sport for the Independent Football Nation built on the back of the working classes. After all, football has been a sport, nay the sport for the working class the world over since its inception, or close enough.
The relationship between football and socialism off the pitch has been analysed countless times by observers from all viewpoints. It’s a well-treaded path. Perhaps most obviously there’s Liverpool – Shankly, clearly defined red politics, food banks, banning The Sun, singing You’ll Never Walk Alone, and Justice for The 97 – their credentials are hard to ignore. If you know more than the basics then you might point to FC St Pauli or Celtic as other outspoken socialist clubs. Delve a little deeper and maybe you think that the hands-on approach of Union Berlin fits the socialist mould nicely too. Or maybe a nice trip to Tuscany is on the cards to hear the communist Livorno ultras chanting still about Cristiano Lucarelli and singing Bella Ciao. Closer to home there’s International Merthyrism. But, for the most part, these are examples of a relationship between clubs and fans - socialism in the stands, if you will. Much less has been made of the relationship between club and player – socialism on the pitch.
But what is socialism on the pitch? Taking what you know about socialism at its dictionary definition – a “social organization which advocates that the means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned or regulated by the community as a whole” – and you might first cast your mind to Totaalvoetbal of the Ajax and Netherlands teams of the 1970s. It certainly fits the bill. Equality was at the root of the system and each player would have to play their role for the system itself to function. In many ways, the system required a functioning community to work. The system’s community had total control over their means of production on the pitch and it was beautiful. Individual strengths were highlighted, individual weaknesses masked by the strength of the team, and in the process the collective level was raised. It’s a compelling start.
Maybe an even better fit is juego de posición – Guardiola’s upgrade on totaalvoetbal. The goal was the same and the outcomes were even more successful in terms of silverware. The main difference between the two being less of a reliance on the individual. Dribbling and individual positional change was replaced, simply, by passing. Moments of individual brilliance were – excluding the existence of Leo Messi – replaced by passing triangles and tiki taka. More of a reliance on the collective, less of a reliance on the individual.
But neither of these philosophies were ever explicitly socialist or even political in nature, and neither philosophy grew out of socialist communities. Some argue that the Dutch system grew out of a national psychological characteristic related to the physical and metaphysical control of space. The Netherlands, long famous for their control over their geographical space, were maybe ontologically predisposed to creating a particular footballing philosophy that also played with space. Meanwhile Guardiola’s system was merely a descendent of that Dutch method that became infused with the maturing approaches of La Masia and then exposed to the greatest footballer of all time, who pushed the boundaries of what was thought to be possible on a football pitch.
Maybe socialist football has to be rooted in a political landscape that is authentically socialist and, if that is to be the case, there’s a compelling case to be made for the philosophy of Valeriy Lobanovskyi. If you’re of a certain age (or you’ve read Inverting The Pyramid) then you might remember his name, but if you don’t know him then consider Lobanovskyi to be the Soviet Union’s version of Rinus Michels or Johan Cruyff, maybe a bit of both. Born in the USSR in 1939, he landed on his own football philosophy at around the same time as the Dutch masters in the 70s and, to all intents and purposes, it was basically modularized totaalvoetbal.
Lobanovskyi would call it ‘smart universalisation’ – totaalvoetbal but with the recognition that individuals could not always perform to the same level in every position, though they still likely excelled in more than one role. He saw, according to Jonathan Wilson, that “the efficiency of the sub-system was greater than the sum of the efficiencies of the elements that comprise it”. Ultimately, the strength of the team would lay in the connections between players in their sub-systems. He wanted players to express themselves but never to detract from the team, thus everything became heavily systematised. It was successful too – Lobanovskyi managed teams at the highest levels for decades, they almost always performed to a higher level than the sum of their parts and Lobanovskyi died as the second most decorated manager of all time, behind only Alex Ferguson.
So maybe that’s socialist football? A systematised and rigid variation of total football from behind the Iron Curtain. Or maybe it isn’t, there are dissenting voices, naturally, and chief among them is El Flaco.
Cesar Menotti is another name of yesteryear, albeit not one associated with a socialist country. He’s best known as the manager of Argentina between 1974 and 1983, a period which mostly coincides with Argentina’s right wing military junta. It might not seem that these conditions were exactly conducive to socialist football but Menotti was outspoken on his belief and pulled no punches. He remains an outspoken socialist to this day, cut almost stereotypically from the South American mould. But Menotti’s football could not be more different to that of Lobanovskyi. With Argentina embarrassed by the Dutch’s total football in the 1974 World Cup, Menotti went about introducing his form of football to the world. Systematised football and the anti-fútbol of his predecessor was gone, replaced with attacking football in which individual players could express themselves. Part of the reason for this was for results, but it was down to philosophy too. Menotti saw football as a privilege, therefore his players had a duty to inspire, to highlight beauty and remind the public of the strength of cooperation without excessive individual compromise, while also providing hope against the background of a depressing and murderous right wing military dictatorship. El Flaco would famously say “There’s a right-wing football and a left-wing football. Right-wing football wants to suggest that life is struggle. It demands sacrifices. We have to become of steel and win by any method... obey and function, that’s what those with power want from the players. That’s how they create... useful idiots that go with the system.”
“Obey and function” are the key words. In Menotti’s mind, right-wing football meant a conformity to systems with a sacrifice of creativity in order to win. But Menotti was never about winning, not really. He never measured his success in trophies or victories. At the forefront of his mind, even through the darkest days of the so-called guerra sucia, was proving that a better world was possible. Maybe that’s why he described left-wing football as something that “celebrates intelligence and creativity and wants the game to be a festival”, and festivals they were. Menotti borrowed the 4-3-3 from the Oranje which had embarrassed the Albiceleste a few years prior but unshackled his players, allowing them to attack relentlessly and beautifully, especially during the World Cup. While the 1978 tournament win was mired by controversy, it’s worth noting that the Argentine military dictatorship didn’t get the image they wanted the end of it all – Menotti refused to shake the hands of the generals at the end of the final, a clear act of defiance in the face of a genocidal regime.
But where does that leave us? Is left-wing football highly systematic or free-flowing creativity? The basis of left-wing football as Totaalvoetbal seems undeniable – those who’ve professed to play socialist football at the highest level have always seen it that way. But the rest seems up to debate, the only real certainty is the emphasis on teamwork on a moral level. This isn’t team huddles; this is a belief in a fellow teammate that they can cover for you and a knowledge that you can and will support them through whatever football, and maybe even life itself, throws at you. And, for the sake of brevity, we’ll say that, tactically, socialist football lays somewhere between the system of Lobanovskyi and the expressive attacking of Menotti, while politically coming from a culture that is authentically together.
With this in mind, I’d propose that there’s an heir to the throne when it comes to socialist football in the 21st century. There’s arguments for Guardiola and Bielsa, the successors to Cruyff and Menotti respectively, but neither seem to completely fit the bill. There may well be examples playing out on pitches across the world, but none seem sufficiently accessible or obviously backed by a socialist philosophy of the game. Enter the Welsh Way.
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Part Two: The Welsh Way
The Welsh relationship with socialism is, in briefest terms, an incredibly long one. Some trace it all the way back to Cyfraith Hywel – the laws of Hywel Dda which promoted equality, fair distribution of property and, occasionally, positive laws on the rights of women. But that’s a flimsy link going back a millennium. It would be much less tenuous to claim that Wales has been more concretely socialist in modernity.
From the industrial revolution through today, Wales has been home to so many of socialism’s big hitters. Wales shaped some of the world’s great socialist institutions, like Nye taking Tredegar to the big stage with the NHS, and in kind socialism has shaped some of our greatest minds, such as Raymond Williams and his broadening of our understanding of culture. Wales has elected, almost exclusively, socialist mandates for the last century, and what has been seen politically has been replicated culturally as well. In football, talks between socialists on the terraces became socialist fanzines, support for striking miners eventually transformed to the charity pushes and campaigns we see today, such as Gôl Cymru. But this is all socialism in the stands, and it would be misleading to say any obvious socialist football on the pitch had existed until this last decade.
Welsh culture and identity has been deeply rooted in socialism for so long that it was bound to seep into football eventually. Why it did or didn’t bloom until the early 21st century may one day be subject to debate, but given that the Welsh population was more preoccupied with a different ball sport it seems entirely plausible to hypothesise that the socialist Welsh psyche was more engaged with rugby, leading socialist football needing more time to blossom. Whatever the case, the definitive story of socialist football in Wales starts, inarguably, in December 2010.
Gary Speed had long been a Welsh hero before 2010. In a career that spanned nearly a thousand competitive games, the versatile Speed played on the wing, as a 10, in central midfield and as a left-back, and had a reputation as a consummate professional that was friendly and well-regarded by all that knew him. Speed would play 85 times for his nation and still ranks as the 6th most capped player for Wales nearly two decades after he last wore the red shirt. His managerial career was only a handful of months old when he was announced as Wales’s new manager on the 14th of December 2010. Less than a year later, he would be gone.
In death, Gary Speed left a legacy that would alter the course of Welsh footballing history and maybe the course of the nation itself. At this point in time, his legacy includes two appearances at the Euros and a first World Cup for the senior men’s team since 1958. In another decade’s time it may include many more. His legacy is so great for so many reasons, but key among them is this. Speed left to this nation a parting gift in the shape of an idea to be developed – the Welsh Way. It was a simple idea – a way of playing football – that would revolutionise the nation’s game.
When the Welsh Way was cemented as a permanent fixture in Welsh football in 2017 as part of the National Syllabus, then-Technical Director Osian Roberts said “In 2011 Gary Speed introduced a 'Welsh Way' of playing, providing a philosophy, identity and framework for our national coaches to work within and enable young players to move seamlessly through our age-groups and squads.” Roberts expanded on this in 2019 talking with The Coaching Journey, saying “Traditionally Wales would always have been the underdog. And therefore that mentality we took that into our philosophy and into our identity, which is consistent with our culture.” The framework introduced would be flexible and evolve, as seen with the implementation of the updated High-Performance Strategy in 2022, but the philosophy and identity would provide a permanent authentic cultural basis on which to build Welsh football.
What that culture consists of was also summarised nicely by Roberts when he said “It’s our strapline but it’s really not a strapline, it’s how we live and breathe every day which is Together Stronger. And that means everybody. It doesn’t just mean the eleven on the pitch.” The Welsh Way and Together Stronger never just meant Gary Speed either. It was always a collective approach to the beautiful game. Yes, it was initially spearheaded by Gary Speed and Osian Roberts, but it became a truly united approach when the players had to comprehend the loss of their manager. Further to that, Chris Coleman also played an important role in the wake of Gary Speed’s untimely passing. Speaking to Chris Wathan in 2017, Roberts made sure to highlight that – “It was something we started with Gary, to develop this seamless pathway, and Chris has developed it further and pushed it because it's something he believes in.” Successive Wales managers have believed in it and will continue to do. The collective belief in the project rooted in an authentic culture of togetherness tied Welsh football not just to Welsh cultural life but to the Welsh political psyche too.
With all this being said, the Welsh Way truly embodies a culture of togetherness and offers a collective approach to the beautiful game that is representative of wider Welsh life. But embodying the socialist culture of Wales is one thing – does the Welsh Way lay between the systematised football of Lobanovskyi and the expressive free-flowing attacking of Menotti when it comes to the philosophy on the pitch?
If socialist football needs to offer a systematised kind of football that has a cooperative style of play and allows expressive attacking then the Welsh Way fits the bill impeccably.
Lobanovskyi’s form of socialist football, although based on Totaalvoetbal, was heavily systematised. Players were divided into sub-systems which came together to form the system. The outcome was swift counter-attacking football with choreographed sleights and coordinated movements off-the-ball. There was some room for individual expression but not much because Lobanobskyi was a perfectionist and obsessively so. When he won the league with Dynamo Kyiv at 22, he famously said “Yes, we have won the league, but so what? Sometimes we played badly. We just got more points than other teams who played worse than us. I can’t accept your praise as there are no grounds for it.” That perfectionism would follow him as a manager where teams would remember plays as if they were an American football team.
The Welsh Way is also systematised but not to the same degree as Lobanovskyi’s teams. The game is first broken down into 4 “moments of the game”, known as the Game Model: in possession, out of possession, attacking transitions, and defensive transitions. But rather than being provided with a playbook as if they were an American football team, the Welsh Way provides simple instructions to players that seek to provide a basis for play that can be interpreted in many ways. The instructions are simple for a reason too – they don’t just inform the senior players on how to play, they’re intended to educate young players within the youth systems on how the Welsh teams, present and future, play. It’s a long term plan that is already paying dividends. Players like Harry Wilson, Ethan Ampadu, Dan James, Neco Williams and more have all benefited from this. It’s important to add that tactics aren’t set in stone for teams playing under the Welsh Way’s philosophy, they’re intended to be flexible. Osian Roberts points to the success of the philosophy for this. The philosophy incorporated the underdog nature of the team and of Wales writ large, but there’s also recognition that the philosophy itself creates teams so interconnected and together that they become ball-dominant and, on occasion, the favourites in games.
However, as previously discussed, socialist football isn’t about total conformity to a system of football. As Menotti would have it, socialist football must also allow individual expression, intelligence, creativity and, ideally, prove that a better world is possible.
The Welsh Way allows this through recognising the role of creative individuals in the system. A prime example of this is the “Maverick” role, as it’s termed by the FAW. They stress that individual players and moments of magic change games and inspire others. These are players that see the things others don’t, make that difficult pass or shot possible, do the unpredictable and change games on their own. There’s recognition of their flaws too – they can be frustrating or risky, make defensive errors and challenge coaches – but these players are allowed and even encouraged to experiment. Menotti envisioned socialist football as something that “celebrates intelligence and creativity and wants the game to be a festival” and the Welsh Way does this through catering to the mavericks of the game. Although systematised, it creates a culture and a footballing environment in which there is opportunity to experiment, a freedom to fail and a no-fear culture – all elements of which Menotti would approve. Does this mean that sometimes the Welsh Way fails to achieve results? Yes, of course. But the risk is worth the reward when the footballing environment raises the ceiling of a team exponentially and creates moments which can inspire millions. Without the Welsh Way, there’s no Euros or World Cup 2022. It’s a footballing philosophy that allowed an Independent Football Nation to dream and believe that a brighter future is ahead of it.
The Welsh Way comes from an authentic socialist background and provides a style of play that takes the best elements of the socialist footballs of Lobanovskyi and Menotti to create a new form of socialist football for the 21st century. While this philosophy can be implemented by any other teams successfully, and there’s enough evidence to suggest that is already the case, it seems as though the philosophy is at its strongest with the Wales senior men’s team. Earlier I noted that socialist football meant a belief in a fellow teammate that they can cover for you and a knowledge that you can and will support them through whatever football, and maybe even life itself, throws at you. Life threw the Wales team the most difficult hand in 2011. Not only did they lose a revolutionary manager but a hero and friend too. The team could have capitulated permanently, reverted to type, but they didn’t. They came to embody Wales in a way no sports team or cultural icon ever has and did so through embracing an ethos central to this nation – Together Stronger. ▪