New coach Neville’s willing to be bold
Phil Neville didn’t waste time on opening up on the style of soccer he’s aiming to bring to South Florida.
In his first interview since being named Inter Miami CF’s second head coach earlier in the week, the former Manchester United and Everton player touched on wanting to bring an attractive playing style to Inter Miami CF Stadium.
“When the supporters come to the stadium, I want them to see the team play with an identity and say, ’Yeah, this is an Inter Miami team, an exciting team that play a real open brand of football,’ ” Neville said an in interview released by the club. “We want to be aggressive, we want to play on the front foot, we want to go out and try to win every single game.
“I am not a coach that likes to sit back. I said when I started my journey as a coach, I wanted to be as brave as possible. I wanted to try to win every single
game of football.
“I am going to stay true to those values at Inter Miami. I think the supporters will enjoy the band and style of football I want to play.”
Neville’s work with the England women’s national soccer team backs up his words. He implemented a quicker, more possession-based style of play that emphasized short passing in the attack’s buildup after
taking over the Lionesses in 2018.
England saw significant bumps in its share of possession percentage (41.8% to 50.9) and attempted passes per 90 minutes (316.2 to 474.8) from tournament matches in 2017 to games it played under Neville (excluding World Cup qualifying games), according to Stats Perform.
Expect Neville to try to instill a similar playing style with Inter Miami after it ranked No. 24 and No. 20, respectively, in MLS last year in attempted passes per 90 minutes (440.2) and possession (47.1%) during its inaugural season.
Neville’s England teams consistently looked to build their attack from the backline, control the midfield and take advantage of whichever opportunities presented themselves in the final third.
“We’ve got to be brave on the ball,” Neville said during an interview with The Coaches’ Voice, where he was breaking down England’s win against France in the 2018 SheBelieves Cup.
“We’ve got to be bold. We’ve got to be courageous.”
Neville’s approach to the game appears to be different than his predecessor. Diego Alonso was often criticized during the 2020 season for being too pragmatic and predictable on offense by mainly trying to attack from out wide.