The Premier League's Next Great Tactician?: Running The Game with Andoni Iraola
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As you watch that first five or ten minutes, can you describe the questions that you're asking yourself in your own mind? Yeah, the setup of the other team, for example, against City. We were preparing for an inverted fullback all the week. They played a plain 4-3-3 with no one inverted. We have to change everything in four or five minutes, no more. And you have to talk to the one closest and you don't know how the message is going to arrive to the other side. MUSIC

Today, it's the latest episode of our new series, Running the Game, which is designed to take you into the minds of the leaders, shaping football from a leadership and business perspective. And it's time to get a lesson, essentially, in how to watch a game of football, to learn how an elite Premier League manager processes tactics.

and what computations go through his mind the second the ball kicks off in front of him. And I'm beyond delighted to welcome a gent I've admired so much over the past season and a bit, in which he's rolled into Bournemouth. Commercially a smaller club, but one with enormous ambition under an American owner, Las Vegas Golden Knights Bill Foley. And to close the gap between, let's say, revenue,

and ambition and results he's hired a young Basque boss 42 year old Adonis Iraola who's announced himself as one of the most tactically astute and flexible thinkers in the modern Premier League it's a joy to welcome a gent about whose team former Barca manager Xavi called the biggest pain in the arse to play Sabluka gave up a law degree to become a footballer but has still found time somehow to read the entire work of Haruki Murakami

Welcome to the quite singular Bournemouth manager, Antonio Rola. Hello, Roig. I don't know what to say now after all this. You told me I cannot say anything else. Let's go back to the beginning.

The club team you started to play on as a kid, I think age nine, that produced you in the 1990s alongside Mikel Arteta and Xabi Alonso amongst others. It was called, and I'm definitely not butchering this, I think it was called Antiguo Co. Very well done.

At the time, you didn't think you'd make a living in football when you were a kid. Turns out almost everybody in that golden team did. When you were a child, what was it about that upbringing, that place, that team that gave you the tool not just to become a professional footballer, all of you, but later managers too? I cannot give you the secret because I don't know it. I suppose it's a matter of good coaching, good culture.

Probably we were doing very good stuff without knowing it because we were not expecting to be professional football players. We were not a big club because now probably people start to know Antiguoco but it was a very, very small club before 30 years ago and I think we have a sporting culture that I think is good but I also think that

I've been living in the US. You have an incredible sporting culture and it could happen everywhere, I would say. I want to talk to you about management, but we do need to acknowledge you had a long career as a goal scoring right back for Athletic Bilbao. 510 appearances, I think a dozen seasons, 38 goals, four seasons as captain.

You finished here in New York with NYC FC. In a season and a half, Patrick Vieira turned you into a defensive midfielder behind Andrea Perlow and Everton legend Frank Lampard. And you've said that you credit this time under Vieira for sparking your interest to go into management. What were you thinking about? What ideas were percolating in New York that eventually ended up with this career in management?

For me, it was a very, very interesting season and a half, family-wise, because it's always lovely to live somewhere like Manhattan. And also in the coaching side, because I started already thinking that what I'm going to do once I finish my career, that I see that it's there around the corner. I didn't have the legs to keep doing what I was doing as a right-back, so I had to adjust my position and start playing in the midfield.

And Patrick came from a philosophy very, very different from the ones I've experienced in athletic club because we normally are not so focused on possession. And Patrick was coming from the city academy, everything on the ball, very professional.

positional play and it gave me different tools that I started using when I was coaching even if it's not exactly the same philosophy as we have. So it was just the challenge of the idea that lit a fire for you Andoni? Yes, I started playing as a number six. I had to understand more or less the connection between all the lines, control not just yourself, not start playing your game, just something more collective and

where we have our strengths, where we have our weaknesses as a team, what we have to cover, be aware of not just the ball, everything that is happening around you. And I think it was a

A very, very good season, especially the last one with Patrick there in New York, as a step towards the coaching career, yes. It's fascinating. So a change in position, a change in perspective, a change in footballing philosophy changed your own, opened your mind and you leapt into management. Your first gig came in, of all places, Cyprus at AEK Larnaca.

June 2018... You only went and won the Cypriot Super Cup... Qualified for the Europa League... For I think the second time... In club history... Next you returned home to Spain... Second division Mirandes... Where you made a quite glorious run... To the Copa del Rey semis... Knocking out three big boy La Liga teams on the way... And after a year there...

you joined Rayo Vallecano. This is a club with the second smallest stadium in the division where shots sometimes end up in the apartments behind the goal. The net spend was 12.5 million over your three years there. But in your first season, you got them promoted. Second season, another Copa del Rey semi-final. Third season, you incredibly, still can't believe it, and I watch these games, you did the

double over Barcelona for the first time in club history these successes far outstrip your financial means at the club Andoni how would you build a footballing philosophy that allows you to overachieve so drastically

I would say I'm not consider myself as a very brave person, but coaching, I haven't been afraid of taking brave decisions. I went to Cyprus because it was the first chance that appeared and I said, OK, let's try, let's make mistakes. But I wasn't too scared of even failing. If I fail, I fail. So I think all my career has been a little bit like this. Take the next step, try certain things, believe in yourself,

the things that you think can make you more successful as a team and obviously it's not always win no no there are ups and downs and there are moments where you think now it's going to be a tough moment but overall I'm really happy I think I've gone step by step to clubs where I could coach better players and at

adaptation for me is key as a manager. And a human being, no doubt. I'm picking that up from the way that you live your life. But are there similarities? Are there core principles? Is there a core philosophy in terms of the attributes of an Iriola team? What connects all of your squads in terms of style?

I haven't changed too much. If you see my first games in Cyprus, probably you will recognize my team. We started doing a lot of things that probably now we do a little bit better because I've made mistakes in the way. But I think my ideas are quite clear. Everyone says that

Okay, we need a lot of physical players, the rhythm we play, very vertical. But it's because we think it's the best way to win games. I'm quite practical in this way. If someone tells me, okay, no, if you play differently, you play a little bit more compact, waiting a little bit more in a low block, staying more time on the ball, you will get the result. I have no problem to adapt. But I feel like...

I really feel comfortable when I see that my team is going forward, is wanting to win the game. And that's what we try to do.

Summer 2023, you join the Premier League with Mighty Bournemouth, a team that the previous season had the second deepest defensive line in the league. I think they just avoided relegation by five points. They wanted a change and billionaire American owner Bill Foley, who is a quite singular character, we've had him on this show. He admitted, quote,

Style of play was an important factor in bringing you in. So you set about transforming this club from one of the deepest defensively to one of the more front-footed. What does that process even look like from the inside? What's the most important first step that you take when you arrive? For me, it was a key part of my decision of coming here. They were not offering me the job because I had been more or less successful initially.

is because they had spent time watching our teams, how we played. They wanted to change a little bit how Bournemouth was playing. And...

I think when someone respects you, spends time on you, the first time they talked to me, I realized, okay, these guys know what they are talking about. They know what they are trying to do. So I felt like very supported even before arriving, you know, like, okay, this is, we are signing you because we want you to do what you are doing there with the players that we have that

I also think can adapt very well to these ideas and that's what we try to do. Obviously, it didn't start well. It cost us some games.

But luckily, especially for me and supposedly for Bournemouth, everything has gone in a better direction. And I feel very, very thankful. I always say it with the players, with the club, because they understood every time what we were trying to do. By the way, listeners who don't know who Bill Foley is, find that episode. He's got a great quote in it where he says, there's nothing more limited than being a limited partner of Bill Foley's. But when you move to Bournemouth,

You wanted to bring your assistant manager, Inigo Perez, but he was denied a work permit. So I think the only member of your staff you brought along with you was your fitness coach, Pablo de la Torre, who'd been with you in Cyprus. He'd been with you at Rio Vallecano. And I was always fascinated by that detail. What makes fitness such an essential ingredient to your style of play?

Yes, I think it's something that you have to build every day in training. If you want to play one way, we have to train the same way, with the same intensity, with the same reaction speed, with the same answers every day, because there are habits. I believe a lot in habits and I think Pablo has been very helpful. I wish I could also have come with Íñigo, but...

You know, these rules, I don't understand because he's now coaching in La Liga and he cannot be assistant for us in the Premier League. But it is what it is and we cannot move it. But I've also been very lucky because the staff I found here in Bournemouth, top level guys, very top professionals. I'm working really, really happy and very efficiently, I think. But for me, the key are the habits. It's not, I don't believe too much in, I always said it, in motivation.

You can be motivated for one game, for one final, but I trust much more in the everyday, the discipline, the culture you create inside the club and we try to do it. And I think we have a good group of players that is helping us a lot. Fitness, culture, habits, essentially structure is what you are setting out to create. And you've hinted at it. You start to life in the Premier League. Let's just say it was a rude introduction. No wins in the first nine games, which in...

English football, which is a crisis community, that is an eternity. And you were trying to settle into England. You were trying to revamp a team on the fly. The previous season, I think Bournemouth had let Scott Parker go after just four games. So 26 days into that season, honestly, internally, were you still like, I don't fear failure or was part of you fearing for your job?

No, I didn't feel any... You know, the club was very clear with me. They weren't worried. We had a very difficult schedule and they were saying, don't worry because...

"past season, these games we played, we didn't win any of the games, so keep doing your job". Probably I was, myself, more worried. There is a moment where you think, "OK, if we don't get the results, players will start not believing in the things we are doing". So there was a moment when, for the players to continue doing all the effort we were demanding, to continue performing well every training,

you needed the results and luckily for us it arrived we did a very very good second part of the season let's say and things were easier especially for me yes Yeah that 10th game the 2-1 win over Burnley the transformation began to kick in and here's what I'm fascinated by the realities of the modern game results are meant to be dictated by budget Bournemouth

They have one of the more limited budgets in the Premier League, smaller stadium capacity, 11,379, which means to compete, you have to be smarter than almost all those around you in almost every aspect of the game, recruitment, scouting, and especially the tactics.

And Pep Guardiola talks about sequestering himself in a dark room for hours at a time into the middle of the night, pondering tactical conundrums before he emerges into the daylight with the solution. But you've said...

Your ideas come at random moments, like you'll be doing the dishes at home. Suddenly, you'll have to write down notes on something that hits you out of the blue. Can you talk about your process tactically, week to week, where you build that tactical plan for the Premier League opponent? How far before the game does that begin?

I think there is a workflow, there is a system we work on all the week. We have different meetings on the ball, without the ball, set plays, different analysts, goalkeeping. We have our Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and there is a process and the team goes building. I'm not the one deciding the team very early in the week. Sometimes I even decide some starters the same day of the game or even the night before.

I think we go building the team during the week. We are working, we talk with the staff, we say what kind of players we need for this type of style, of idea for this week. And then it becomes quite natural. But it is true that sometimes you are doing all the other stuff with the kids or...

And then I normally go with a pen and the paper always. I like to write the notes and I know now we are really, you know, the computers and this, but I prefer to go with the pen and the paper. And after the week, I normally have quite a lot of papers and then we finish with the final idea, yes.

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But your players, I'm imagining each of them is different in terms of how much they can take tactically in terms of instruction. How complex are your tactical briefings and do they differ player to player? I always say if you have cleared your idea tactically, everyone has to understand you very easy. The ones that have their mind more clear, they explain themselves and in one, two minutes, everyone has understood what they are talking about. If you need information,

25 minutes to explain something that is too complicated and I don't think it's a good idea for the players. I think we are not so important at the end of

The game is for the players. The level of the players, what the players know, what they are prepared to adapt to live in the game. Because sometimes you work all the week thinking, OK, they are going to play like this, we are going to press like this, we are going to try to build like this. And then the game starts, in five minutes you have to change everything because it wasn't like you expected, they have surprised you and then...

The players have to be the ones with one, two, three instructions to adapt, to change things. And I think it's a matter of time that they start thinking a little bit like you think. And probably later, but it's a process that, especially now that we are in the second season, I think we are experiencing and I think it's nice. So you talk about that first five minutes, the opening whistle blows, teams kick off, it's your moment of truth time.

You've spent the week setting up your team. It'll either work or it won't work. What you thought your opponent would do is either real or not real. As you watch that first five or ten minutes, what are you looking for exactly? Can you describe the questions that you're asking yourself in your own mind?

Yeah, the setup of the other team. For example, against City, we were preparing for an inverted fullback all the week. Normally, they do it with Rico Lewis. They decided not to play with Rico Lewis. They played a plain 4-3-3 with no one inverted. So our tactical setup...

was not really prepared for a 4-3-3, but 4-3-3 is something that we normally face very well. We kind of like to play against 4-4-3, so we have to change everything in four or five minutes, no more, because otherwise they are going to punish you. And I think we did quite well, and these things, once you know each other, take less time. So after, in the second half, they didn't use wingers, they put everyone inside, they put very high fullbacks, so you have to change again.

So we have to adapt. We have references now. We remember the game against Aston Villa, the one previous to Man City and say they did this. So let's take this automatism that we had. And this has to go live. Sometimes you cannot communicate with the players because Premier League stadiums are quite loud and you have to talk to the one closest and you don't know how the message is going to arrive to the other side.

but it's what we have to get used to and I think it's once you even make mistakes I think you get better you have some good connections with players and at the end are the players the ones who have to take the difficult decisions and

And Tony, in the media, we talk about plan A isn't working. They've got to go to plan B. But how many micro adjustments tactically do you think you're actually working? I mean, there's planned C, D, E, F, G, H, I. I mean, how many actual tactical tweaks are you making in a game? Can you put a number on it?

No, it's very difficult because sometimes you don't even consider, like, you think this is not going to happen today. And you have to go like, you remember four games ago what we prepared against...

you luckily for us there are always players who are tactically really smart who can control the others especially the ones in the middle you know you have to have the number six the number eight the number ten i think they have to be quite smart to adapt things to change things sometimes we jump with the number 10 otherwise we jump with the wingers they have to control a little bit and if you have this this middle of the pitch

that they know what they are doing, I think it gets easier. That's the brain there. I mean, how much of the tactical changes are pre-planned and how much are reactions to the game state improvised? I'm curious how far ahead in the chess match of the game you're thinking. You've laid a tactical surprise. Do you predict...

No, for example, in the half-time when you are winning a game, it's true that you expect something from the opposition. And sometimes you start already, if they play with a back five, maybe they can change to a back four. If they change to a back four, we are going to match up like this, we are going to attack like this.

just in case it happens or when they are going to do a sub, for example, when they are going to do two, three players, I kind of prefer to wait a little bit my subs to see how they adjust and then maybe one or two minutes later once I've seen

how they set up and how the new picture is. Maybe we have to, not just to make a new sub, but to give the information to the new player to say, OK, it's not that you are entering, you have to go with yourself and the information to the others that now we have to do other things. And it's the things that we do, probably the people outside

are not aware of every small adjustment. But I think the ones that are inside the teams, they know this stuff, yes. A substitute and the messenger. You mentioned half-time. How much can a player take on mentally at half-time? What is your goal in that half-time team talk? How much is tactics? How much is just you going on kind of full Andoni Churchill?

I've learned from this, I think. At the beginning, I was too emotional in half times. I was reflecting too much on what had happened in the first half. And now, even if we are not playing well, I try to make it look not as bad and focus more on the changes we are going to do, on the adjustments we have to do, without being as emotional.

Because the experiences I've had is when you push too much the players and you try to provoke like an answer from them.

I haven't liked them. And sometimes you have to do it, but I think it's the less of the times. And I think you have to go quite practical in the approach and try to change the things without killing them in the half time. Otherwise, their head in the second half is going to be in another place, I think. Oh my God. By the way, I say oh my God because I'm thinking about what you did to Everton in the last minutes, which still too soon, too soon. But the great Johan Cruyff,

One said, playing football is very simple, but playing simple football is the hardest thing there is. And the truth is, the best teams do not always win football games. There's luck, there's variance, there's an unbreakable curse where the team I'm rooting for I know will lose. That's just how it works. But you need to create a team, a system, an idea that will win over the long haul. So I'm curious, what determines if you see a particular game as success, even if you happen to lose it?

I think you have to trust a lot the players, because football is not black or it's not white. You cannot say we are going to do this all the time, we are going to do the other thing, we are never going to do this.

I think the players have to take decisions live during the games and you have to try to make them understand why sometimes it's good we go and we press and we jump. Sometimes why it's good we stay more compact and we wait them to make a mistake. And if everyone is kind of in synchrony, things look natural and look quite easy. But to arrive to this point

collective mindset I think it's not it's not easy and I agree with what you said football we have to make it look as simple as we can but this is not easy at all So what is the one thing the biggest thing Andoni that football fans do not understand about the tactical flow of football from a manager's perspective?

I think that everything is related. Sometimes they love one player because offensively he's very good and he gives us a lot of threat in behind and he can go one against one. But probably it makes us weaker in other sides and we have to balance everything. It's difficult sometimes to judge because sometimes some players... I don't judge by the numbers. I don't think number nine is going to play because he's scoring goals. I always tell the players...

If the team is playing well while you are on the pitch, you have more chances to play. Even if we are not winning that game because we are playing well, you are doing your part, I think you have more chance to play than someone who probably scores two goals but makes us play worse. Because long term, I prefer a more collective way of thinking, yes. That's great.

So it's a bit like being a chef and spices and balance ultimately. Too much of one thing can overpower everything. And Tony, you've said that you were very emotional and you've had to tone it down. You've also said that you quote, suffer a bit less as a manager than you did when you were a player.

But in those final minutes, as you awaited the final whistle against Manchester City with your team 2-1 up, you had Erling Haaland, that 93rd minute header, which he rose up, hit it at the keeper and then clanked the rebound into the base of the post. What were you experiencing? Do you allow yourself to experience emotions, especially when the final whistle goes, the game ended, you're fighting war cherries had beaten Manchester City. What does that feel like in that moment?

Obviously, you feel very happy, very happy for the players especially. I've been a player, I still feel like a player and I see when they receive the reward that they deserve, I feel happy for them, obviously for the supporters, but especially for the players, no?

But it's true that I try, even if we lose, we win. I always say it's 24 hours. 24 hours I allow myself to enjoy or to suffer and then you have to start thinking in the next game. But obviously you have to enjoy when you win teams like City because it's not going to happen a lot of times. I hope we can do it more times, but normally it doesn't happen a lot.

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I've heard word that you're an immense NFL fan and I believe you're a New York Giants fan. Daniel Jones to the cherries. How did that happen? And when you're watching the game, Steve Kerr once told me he watches Premier League soccer, takes that back to his understanding of the NBA. Do you watch NFL and bring back elements of leadership and coaching into your own management style?

I watch NFL because I love the game. I enjoyed it a lot when I was living in New York. I could go to some games, not a lot, because I used to go when I could to see the Jets, to see the Giants. But it's true that I became a Giants fan. And I think I always said NFL is like a succession of set plays in football.

you know and everything is very worked and I would like to know more about how they prepare for so many set plays you know the playbook I imagine has to be huge and a lot of players involved on the same place and I think there is a coordination there there is a

For sure, a summer work that we don't see, that has to be really, really difficult. And I would like one day to go there and see how all this process works. Yes. The NFL is just Nicholas Jova designing a sport and thriving at it. By the way, I did speak to the Ryans, the Chicago-based family who are minority owners of the Bears and of Bournemouth.

As you say, when you're ready to come and fix the Bears, Andoni, I think the opportunity is yours. I enjoyed that Bears game the other day here in London. They played really well against Jacksonville. I could also watch it with the owners there and it was a lovely, lovely experience. I think they have also a lovely future now with Caleb Williams, with new signings. The offense looks good and I hope...

They improved the last season. For sure it will happen. We just need to play all our games in London, Andoni. Thank you for teaching me about how to watch essentially a game of football through your eyes. I will never watch a game the same again. To you and to your team, to your family, to more. Esteric Ascol. Esteric Ascol. Thank you very much. It has been a pleasure. Courage.

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