Football Food For Thought / Mike Norman / 20 October 2008 /

"Mystical" Mike Norman on how the big man and small man partnership is about so much more than route one football these days and tells us why Crouch and Defoe can form a striking combination upon which Portsmouth can build a very solid Premiership season.

Not seeing eye-to-eye on a football pitch doesn't always mean two teammates at loggerheads with each other. Far from it in fact, because in Jermaine Defoe and Peter Crouch's case the reason they don't see eye-to-eye has nothing to do with any hatred to one another, it's all down to height - one is little and the other is large.

Yet on the pitch Defoe and Crouch have struck up an extremely good partnership, already scoring eight Premiership goals between them for a Portsmouth team that has had some difficult early season fixtures.

The reason why a 'little and large' format works in football has more to do with ability than height nowadays, because over the last 20 years or so the way it has been adopted has changed dramatically. I remember watching Middlesbrough take on Bradford City in the mid-1980s and all City did was whack the ball long to the lanky, Peter Crouch-like Ian Ormondroyd who would try and flick it on for his much smaller teammate. It was similar at Wimbledon - balls launched from the back to big John Fashanu, who would try and hold it up and bring his little midfield runners (Dennis Wise especially) into the play.

Defenders just used to stand their ground back then, knowing that either a bigger or better-timed leap would clear the danger. These days it's completely different, with little and large combinations being good footballers, not just players to aim for and run off. Some credit for that must go to Sunderland, who in the shape of Niall Quinn and Kevin Phillips had arguably the best, and most feared, little and large partnership the Premiership has ever seen.

Quinn (like Crouch) wasn't just a tall target man, he was a bloody good footballer who could play with the ball at his feet as well as many of his peers. Phillips (like Defoe) was a clinical finisher who could find the net from anywhere. In the 1997/98 season, Quinn and Phillips scored 46 goals between them, with only a small percentage of those goals coming via the long ball route. Sunderland played the ball around, crossed from deep to Quinn who more often than not would win the ball and find a teammate. Phillips would sometimes take the ball at his feet on the edge of the box, and when Quinn (his decoy) spun off, the way was paved for Phillips to dispatch the ball into the corner of the net.

You see, it not just about being tall and winning the flick-ons for your smaller, much speedier partner, it's about having an understanding, knowing what each other is going to do, where they are going to run - it's about knowing each other's game.

Everyone knows how Emile Heskey is going to play, yet he is high on the list of attackers that defenders hate to play against. Michael Owen and Wayne Rooney have both proved for England that they can play with Heskey, and in doing so they prove that a little and large partnership is not just about the physical size of a footballer, it's about understanding each other's very different style of play. Perhaps defenders are so fearful of long balls for 90 minutes that they don't play their natural game.

Defoe and Crouch will score goals all season long because they have built up a tremendous partnership and compliment each other so well. Portsmouth will knock the ball around, cross from deep, play the ball to feet etc. Crouch will shoot from anywhere, so will Defoe, and they will both be there to pick up each other's scraps in the penalty box. What Portsmouth won't do is play a Wimbledon/Bradford 80s style long ball game just because they have a tall striker - those days have well and truly gone at the top level.

Jermain Defoe has five Premiership goals to his name this season and he is the solid [2.12] favourite to be the Top English Goalscorer. Given an injury-free season he has the ability to score 20 plus goals, making the [9.0] currently available in Premiership Top Goalscorer market worth a wager. Cristiano Ronaldo ([8.0]) hasn't hit top goal-scoring form yet whilst the worry for backers of Fernando Torres ([4.5]) is the amount of niggling injuries he picks up.

Peter Crouch will do well to get within five goals of Defoe come what May and as a consequence doesn't appeal at [13.0] to be the Top English Goalscorer. Wayne Rooney, at [3.5], is the most obvious of the other Englishmen to bag more goals than Portsmouth's little man, whilst free-scoring midfielders Frank Lampard and Steven Gerrard can currently be backed at [8.0] and [27.0] respectively.

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