Covalent Bonds

Ipswich blogger and podcaster Harry Wainwright (aka Harry From Bath) once coined the metaphor “covalent bonds" to describe the partnerships, connections and mutual knowledge between players which made football teams function well. It was a shorthand for how players with inter-dependent roles, like a right back and a right winger or a pair of centre midfielders, might function together. How they might learn to anticipate each other's positioning and movement, becoming more than the sum of their individual talents. It is a metaphor borrowed from Chemistry, used to describe the way atoms bond by sharing electrons, balancing attractive and repulsive forces, to form stable molecules. The word derives from "valence" - the relative capacity to unite, react and interact.

As AFC Wimbledon lined up a free kick in stoppage time on Wednesday night and Christian Walton bellowed instructions to his backline of Ben Johnson, Dara O'Shea, Cameron Burgess and Conor Townsend (which had already proven incapable of repelling similar aerial balls three times that night), I thought about covalent bonds. The connections that make units strong and stable, the unpredictable effects that swapping out one “atom” might have on the overall chemical balance. Ipswich had been slow and scruffy in possession, disorganised without the ball. New components had shown individual attributes, Jens Cajuste his athleticism, O'Shea his pace and crisp passing, but nothing much added up. Electrons out of alignment, Cameron Burgess losing aerial duels.

Walking out of the ground after a humiliating defeat on penalties, I was fretting. Saturday's opponents Fulham started their previous two fixtures with eleven players retained from the previous season. To a man they knew their roles, their shape, their patterns. This was an excellent team with a fine coach, looking to build on a promising start to their season. Mid-table Premier League teams don’t pick up a lot of away wins (Fulham managed only four last season), so their fans must have been eyeing this game against fresh meat hungrily. There was every chance they’d simply roll over a half-baked team where everyone must still be wearing name badges to training. On the journey home, I pondered whether we could somehow start the team from Ipswich versus Exeter, May 2023. At least they’d know what the plan was. How long does a chemical reaction take? Most Ipswich fans now shudder at the memory of waiting for Paul Cook’s team to "gel" and fly up the table, but when we sacked him there were plenty prepared to insist that it was precipitous to expect to see the best of our demolition/rebuild inside a few months. Twelve new faces isn't quite the same as the nineteen who arrived that Summer, but on Wednesday it still felt like getting it all to work according to McKenna's complex schema would be a Herculean effort. Perhaps I worry too much. The boss inherited a shambles in December 2021 and established one of the most resilient teams in the division within weeks. But he had one of the best groups of players in the division at his disposal then, this is a different challenge. You knew there would be energy against Fulham. There's always electrical charge to spare at Portman Road these days. The front four of Szmodics, Hutchinson, Ogbene and Delap crackled and swarmed around Fulham for the first fifteen minutes. When Leif Davis slipped Liam Delap into midfield space and he rumbled and rumbled goalward before spearing the ball past Bernd Leno it felt justifiable on the balance of play, if not quite "deserved". Five more minutes of the ion storm, then things settled into a more disagreeable pattern. Momentarily rattled, Fulham then found some calm and imposed themselves. They aren't a high pressing side but once they'd penned us into our half they kept us there, moving us around, pulling and pushing those fragile, only recently forged connections to their limits. It was the Ogbene-Tuanzebe molecule that fragmented first, Alex Iwobi exploiting the fissure and Antonee Robinson crossing hard and low to Adama Traore, who drilled home an equaliser from near the penalty spot.For a few minutes you wondered if the whole system might collapse. But it held. Indeed, it seemed to strengthen, with the “capacity to unite, react and interact” spreading through the whole network. If the front four's energy was central to our opening salvo, it was the two pivots that were crucial in restoring a foothold in the game. Kalvin Phillips' start to the game had been low key, but his imprint on things got more and more noticeable. He landed on second balls, he got his passing going, he started to… conduct. He also played far closer to Sam Morsy, his new atomic pair. Into the second half the two of them learned each other’s games, they passed and probed, started hoovering up loose balls and touches. They took control of midfield and with it the majority of possession: 63 per cent to 37 per cent in the second half. They look like an extremely complementary duo, a good mix of drive and guile, snarl and savvy.

You worried before kick off that Phillips might bring some of his West Ham funk with him and I was praying there wouldn’t be a major error today. But as he departed in the 70th minute, whipping up the crowd as he went, there was no hint of a self-pitying, down on his luck former superstar. He was a man enjoying his football. Maybe Ipswich is just a nicer place to play these days?

Phillips and Morsy wasn't the only chemical reaction developing on the pitch. The forwards certainly looked like they were getting the hang of our high press. Meanwhile Luke Woolfenden, who at times found himself out of sync with new teammates during our brutalising encounter with Manchester City, quickly discovered that he had the measure of Rodrigo Muñiz, a pesky wasp in comparison to Haaland the rampaging rhino. Secure in the knowledge that he was on top of his own work, he took to continuously bellowing instructions at colleagues, becoming a transmitter for the McKenna system in the absence of Cameron Burgess, historically the talker in our backline. Maybe it was just the lesser threat of the opposition forwards, but the defensive unit began to look more coherent. Many more performances like that and Dara O'Shea might stay on the outside looking in.It was by no means perfect. The midfield took a while to crank into gear. Ogbene has all the attributes of a perfect Wes Burns clone but no-one can read his trigger movements well-enough yet. Muric still looks agitated in body and mind. Leif Davis continues to be isolated and targeted defensively. If we were more the finished article Fulham at home would be the kind of game you would aspire to three points in. We finished the stronger of the two teams but did not merit more than the point we got. As it stands in the phases where we're tactically and territorially dominant, we aren't penetrative enough to create good chances. Conversely when Ipswich are forced to retreat for any period too many openings still appear. Yet, the promise of Saturday was that the system and structure was already bearing fruit in terms of game control. As we develop, forging better connections between centre backs and goalkeeper, between full backs and wingers, between the midfield pair, amongst the front four, our efficiency should improve at both ends. The defensive unit will strengthen in organisation, the forward players will spark off each other. We're good enough to live with a mid-table team already and we're going to get better. My doubt after Wimbledon was whether we could establish sufficient team chemistry quick enough to keep up with this division. Saturday brought the belief that the necessary covalent bonds and collective coherence are ahead of schedule.  

Sam Morsy v Fulham

Minutes 90

Accurate passes 52/58 (90%)

Chances created 1

Expected Assists 0.12

Touches 67

Successful dribbles 2/2 (100%)

Passes into final third 13

Accurate crosses 1/2 (50%)

Accurate long balls 3/4 (75%)

Dispossessed 0

Tackles won 1/1 (100%)

Clearances 3

Recoveries 3

Dribbled past 1

Ground duels won 3/6 (50%)

Fouls committed 2