If Mikel Arteta decided not to stay up late last night, this morning in London he will have woken up with good news regarding the great sporting event from yesterday to today, the Super Bowl. The victory of the Los Angeles Rams will surely have pleased the Basque coach who struck up a good friendship with Sean McVay, the Rams’ headcoach.
The person in charge of uniting the two coaches was Stan Kroenke, owner of both the Arsneal and the new NFL champion franchise. The owner was the point of union for both coaches who began their relationship in the hardest part of the confinement due to Covid-19. By videoconference, both young talents from the benches and the strategy met in a first two-hour video call, according to the English press.
In this they dealt with various tactical issues that converge between soccer and ‘football’. Arteta was interested in the different units (offensive, defensive and special teams) and that specific and separate work. For McVay, the most interesting thing he wanted to get out of Arteta was the team’s discipline and various training exercises he performed at Arsenal.
McVay ended the talk delighted by saying that his counterpart on the Arsenal bench was “a really impressive guy”. Whether they both applied the advice they exchanged with each other remains, but they do know what it’s like to succeed on the bench at a young age. In the early hours of Sunday, McVay broke the record as the youngest head coach to win a Super Bowl at just 36 years old. With just three more years left, Arteta already has two titles as head coach with Arsenal (FA Cup and Community Shield) and is on his way to returning the Gunners to Europe.
For both, the template concept is totally different. While McVay was given several stars of a certain age (Beckham Jr, Von Miller…) to bring Vince Lombardi to California in a great franchise bet, Mikel Arteta tries to build a team from young talent with Bukayo Saka or Smith-Rowe as exponents of the project.
As if he were giving instructions to one of the players on his offensive line or to one of his full-backs going up the attack, both share ‘routes’ and ‘plays’ to get their name down on top.
Iraola was also inspired by the NFL
After leaving Athletic, Andoni Iraola had an experience in New York City that gave him a taste for the bench thanks to Patrick Vieira. Taking advantage of his experience in the Big Apple and the contact he had with the ‘Yankee’ sport, the Basque coach, as happened with Arteta, also saw a relationship between ‘football’ and soccer and saw the way to extract knowledge.
This was recognized in an interview with The Coaches Voice. Outside of football, I have a special interest in the NFL. I see it as an association of set pieces that occur in football. Because, in the end, everything is very well studied: the blockades, the clarifications, the situations of superiority… “, he explained in this medium specialized in the benches.
Iraola leads his Rayo on his way to his particular Super Bowl in the Cup final at Cartuja, although he will need to come back from a 1-2 loss against Real Betis. The coach keeps his team in eleventh position with 31 points in the locker just when they are going through the worst streak in the League so far this season.