Albania Since 1982 (Why Skela & co. were better than today's team)

[Aurora Bulkualis]

I've seen a lot of posters posting crap about Skela, Bogdani, Duro etc... and I made 2 graphs of all the qualification tournaments since 1982 (both World Cup and Euros), showing goals scored per game in each tournament, and goals conceded every tournament.

Here is the amount of goals/game scored since 1982 for every tournament. Notice anything special about 2016? That's because there isn't. We scored on average 1 goal/game (not to mention they were mostly against FC Yerevan defenders), and that's been done at least 4 other times in our history, and we haven't even come close to qualifying those other times. The best result by far was for 2004 qualifiers, when we were using Skela, Duro, Bogdani, Tare, etc.. those overrated players.



Here is where we have actually improved. 2016 marked the first time in our history, we conceded less than 1 goal/game, and that was the first time we qualified for a major tourney. The players that qualified us were Berisha, Hysaj, Mavraj, Cana, Ajeti, Djim, because in offense we were no better than many times in the past.



If Skela & Co had Berisha, Hysaj, Mavraj, Cana, Ajeti, Djim, they would have done a lot better than today's team.

[sylejman]

Or maybe that we play a defensive system with a couple of counters trying to catch our opponents off guard. We scored more goals but we conceded way more also because they played more offensively and less organized. The players of todays team follow a plan and play as a unit, they don't go looking for 2 3 goals a game because they know they will be exposed at the back. The players we had before were terrible, Duro was soo bad, skela although good on the ball had no athleticism whatsoever, Tare was big and his goal scoring record is terrible, Bogdani was an ok striker. The team today is much much better, I use to want to pull my hair out when I watched Albania play in the past with superliga products they could not put two passes together and they played scared it was embarrasing yet I still watched them over and over. So many years went by where the corruption was so clear in the Albanian team with many better players being available and not called up so the superliga scrubs can play and look where that got us, nowhere. As soon as De Biazi came in he did something simple such as searching youtube videos of Albanian players which even kids could do and all of a sudden he found players to help change the structure and the fortune of the team. So that team we had was absolute shit, and the FA was fully corrupt and still is, its just that now with social media they cant escape from calling the players we the fans want. So we are finally turning a positive page and bringing in players who grew up in european academies who have at the least fundamentals instilled in them from a young age, with a few them being pretty good talents or they wouldnt be in those academies in the first place because lets face it no one does albanians any favors anywhere in the world.

[Albo_eagle]

We also played less games in these qualifiers as we were in the group with the least teams.

[Guest]

So we are finally turning a positive page and bringing in players who grew up in european academies who have at the least fundamentals instilled in them from a young age, with a few them being pretty good talents or they wouldnt be in those academies in the first place because lets face it no one does albanians any favors anywhere in the world.

True, no one's doing Albanians any favors now. Imagine how much harder it was for a Superliga player back in the 1990's to get a transfer to a club in Bundesliga.


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[Plako]

So we are finally turning a positive page and bringing in players who grew up in european academies who have at the least fundamentals instilled in them from a young age, with a few them being pretty good talents or they wouldnt be in those academies in the first place because lets face it no one does albanians any favors anywhere in the world.

True, no one's doing Albanians any favors now. Imagine how much harder it was for a Superliga player back in the 1990's to get a transfer to a club in Bundesliga.


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[Migjeni]

Great post, Sylejman - people make Skela sound like fking Iniesta. Dude was slow as fk and lazy. I've not seen anyone hate on Bogdani, as he was a proper striker.

As for goals scored, earlier more goals were scored. Make a match-up between earlier ECs and compare them to that of today and see - this is at least my hypothesis - that fewer goals are scored in general nowadays, because there's more focus on not to conceive from the smaller teams.

[Dallku]

Back then we had wayyyyy more technical players who were wayyy more pleasing to the eye but the balance between those players and the defense, discipline, organization, coaching, etc was a failure and going up against more professional teams was a mismatch. Professionalism always wins over spontaneous shit.

Now it's the exact opposite. We have the the defense and the midfield is made up of professional work horses who help out professional defenders. This "wall" is getting us results. It's ugly as hell to the eye but it's getting results.

[Aurora Bulkualis]

We also played less games in these qualifiers as we were in the group with the least teams.

Everything is per game

Or maybe that we play a defensive system with a couple of counters trying to catch our opponents off guard.

We have always played with the same defensive system. We were never playing attacking football.

It's just today we actually have some proper defenders, and we're organized well. Too bad we went from Serie A strikers (when Serie A was the top league) to FC Vaduz powerhouses.

[Albo_eagle]

Sorry i didn't see it was per game.

We are getting results now, our first ever Euros. I much prefer this.

[Plako]

We have always played with the same defensive system. We were never playing attacking football.

It's just today we actually have some proper defenders, and we're organized well. Too bad we went from Serie A strikers (when Serie A was the top league) to FC Vaduz powerhouses.

We have upgraded immensely in defense by going from Dallku-Aliaj-Çipi to Hysaj-Mavraj-Cana/Ajeti. Even Agolli has been pretty solid in the back.

I think Berisha is better than Strakosha although lately he doesn't seem to be the same player.

In midfield I still prefer "pitbulls" like Abrashi/Xhaka over the more technical old guard that were gassed in 45 minutes.

The one huge hole is the offense: going from Rraklli/Tare/Bogdani to Sadiku/Balaj/Cika is such a huge drop off. I was never too fond of Tare/Bogdani as I didn't think they suited our style of play but they were still better than the current crop. Our most threatening offensive players now are Mavraj (top goalscorer in the qualifiers) and Hysaj. That tells you everything you need to know about our attack.


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