About
A whiteboard that moves.
Total Football started from a simple frustration: the best tactical ideas in the game are explained with a still image and an arrow, or with a clip that cuts away before the interesting part happens.
The method
Drawn, so the whole shape is visible.
Every breakdown is animated from scratch on a scale pitch. Players are counters, the ball is locked to whoever has it, and a camera follows the action the way your eye would. Because it is drawn rather than filmed, the ten players away from the ball are always on screen, and they are usually the ones doing the interesting work.
It also means a moment can be held while a principle is stated, rewound, and run a second time with exactly one variable changed. That two-takes device is impossible with footage and it is the clearest way to show that a decision, not an accident, produced the outcome.
Nothing is borrowed from a broadcaster. That is partly a matter of principle and partly a practical one: the football channels that live on clipped footage spend their lives being taken down.
What the numbers say
- 7 of 23
-
whole-team system clinics broke 20,000 plays
against 1 of 36 individual-technique shorts
- 65%
-
best watch-through rate on the channel
The Underlap, the ceiling for a 20-second explainer
- 0 clips
-
of broadcast footage used, ever
every frame is drawn, which is also why nothing gets claimed
Every editorial rule on this channel came out of a measurement rather than a hunch. When the data said the hot-take format was not working, it was abandoned, even though it was easier to make.
Where to find it
35,000+ and growing.
New breakdowns go out on social first and land in the library here afterwards, laid out so you can read them at your own pace instead of at twenty seconds a system.
