McKenna: There Are Changes and Tweaks Every Week
Friday, 3rd Jan 2025 18:04

Blues boss Kieran McKenna has been speaking about the tweaks he’s made to his system in recent weeks and says it’s hardly unusual for him to amend how his team plays for particular opponents.

Ahead of the Arsenal match, having lost 4-0 at home to Newcastle, McKenna recalled Jacob Greaves and Luke Woolfenden to his backline and moved Dara O’Shea to the right in a formation most saw as a switch to five at the back as the Blues dug in and frustrated the Gunners, who narrowly won 1-0 despite having the lion’s share of the possession.

The Northern Irishman stuck with that trio against Chelsea as Town recorded a famous 2-0 victory over the West Londoners.

“There are changes and tweaks in the team every single week,” McKenna said when asked how pleased he has been with the way his players have adjusted to the recent changes. “And there has been every week since I've been here, to be honest.

“I don't think we've ever gone into two games in a row trying to execute the exact same plan in all phases.

“We're coming off the two games against really good opponents, so that dictates a bit the flow of the game.

“The balance against Arsenal was ever so slightly different on the right-hand side, but you're talking about a really, really marginal difference in how we defend on the right-hand side against Arsenal.

“The balance against Chelsea, in my eyes, was pretty much how we've defended in most of the games this season. So, for me, there are tweaks in every game.

“I know I've said before that we don't really talk about systems or anything like that in the group. It's about individual roles, relationships and responsibilities within each phase of the game and each game plan.

“And we're going to need to do that for every game because the opponents are so strong that we won't be in a position where we can just roll up and have the same game plan in each phase for each opponent.

“So we're trying to adapt and adjust where we can to be as competitive as we can in each game. We've done that well over the last couple of games and we'll try to do it again on Sunday.”

McKenna was asked whether his side’s resilience has increased as the season has progressed.

“I think I've seen it pretty consistently, to be honest,” he reflected. “I think every time we've had a setback over the last three years, I've generally been happy with the response.

“We knew that setbacks were going to be a little bit more frequent maybe this year or a little bit more, a little bit different.

“But I think we've generally shown that and probably the last setback we had in the season was probably the Newcastle game, maybe the first one that got away from us in quite a long time, and the opponent were too good for us on the day and opened up and took the game away from us.

“And I think [it was important to have] a response to that in the Arsenal game, first and foremost, and in the Chelsea game to follow that, two games that would maybe be a fixture schedule over the Christmas period that a lot of teams would have winced at.

“But we took the challenge on, enjoyed the challenge and I think to come out of both games having conceded one goal across the two games and scored two goals, an aggregate win, I think as a response in the Christmas period, it was a really good one and I think we've consistently shown that over a good period of time.”

Does he believe teams will prepare for games against Town differently following the 2-1 win at Spurs and the victory against Chelsea?

“Time will tell. I think teams have paid us good respect all season, I have to say,” he said.

“We've had some wins lately, but we had a really good start to the season at home against Liverpool. We had a run in the autumn of losing very, very few games.

“And I think, in general, in terms of how teams have set up against us, teams have paid us a good amount of respect. Certainly, in the tight games that we lost against Forest and Crystal Palace early in December, I thought the teams paid us a lot of respect.

“So, that is what it is. We have to prepare for the opponent at different stages of the season. You're going to face teams who press you a little bit higher, teams who let you have the ball a little bit more, teams who try and attack you all the time, teams who play a little bit differently.

“We have to be good against all different types of opponents and I think we’ve faced a pretty broad range across the 19 games. And the good thing is we're going to face them all again now. And we've got to try and learn our lessons and be ready for each game as it comes.”

McKenna says he’s learnt a lot over those 19 matches: “There are so many things, so many things, so it would be impossible to narrow them down to anything in particular.

“I know the league, I've been in the league before, but the league changes every year. Every year is different and the league this year is different than last year. It's different than the year before and I think you can see this year how competitive it is, how every team can give every team a game.

“Top teams like Man City and Tottenham at the moment, other teams at different times, have shown that it's really, really hard to win a game in this division. It doesn't matter if you're Ipswich Town or if you're the best team in Europe over the last five seasons.

“So we're learning from each game, we're learning things about the opponents, learning things about ourselves. Of course, we're learning about the group that we've got here because a good chunk of it is a pretty new group that has come together in really testing circumstances.

“We've spoken about a few of those things this week as a group at the halfway point and we're trying to put those lessons into action each and every day and each and every week.”

Looking back at 2024, the year in which he took the Blues back into the Premier League after a 22-year hiatus, McKenna was asked if it was his best year in football so far.

“I've had a few good ones lately, to be honest, and every year is a privilege in football,” he said. “To be involved in the game at any level, to be involved in the game at the highest levels, and to have done it for a lot of years now. Every one is a privilege.”

Regarding the win against Chelsea, he added: “It was a great way to finish the year. As I said before the game, when people were talking about the last game in 2024, it does and did feel like two different years, really.

“In football, you live your life in seasons, not in calendar years, so the start of 2024, the first half, was very different in terms of context to the second half.

“But when you have a win like that and a game like that at our home stadium, it's a nice sort of reflection piece for everyone of all the good moments and all the challenges as well that we had over the calendar year, and a great way to finish on the high.”

Photo: TWTD

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