"Pass and move" and a few other quotes from Paisley and Shanks will show you that they were always thinking of players that can do simple things that lead to brilliant things with the ball and then make more space in which to do it again. It's a simple formula really, and if you have a team of intelligent footballers you can do things with far less effort.
Sometimes I wonder if footballers aren't held back by the fact that they spend so much time playing football and almost zero time thinking about it, or anything else for that matter. Steve Heighway is a good example of the intelligent player who came from out of university and into Liverpool FC showing a level of thinking and poise that comes from, in my opinion, being more rounded of a person than just a footballer. Zidane is a highly intelligent player, and his intelligence shows on and off the pitch (most of the time, but then he never went to university did he?).. I think there are tons of intelligent footballers who get run out of the system by precociousness. The idea that if you can't make it when you are 14 you will be useless when you are 19-30 is complete and utter bollox. Players can learn, evolve, grow into players who far exceed earlier expectations.
Back to the post, its hard to find players who can understand tactics on this level, let alone display them on the pitch. Part of the problem is the system, another part is that its hard to teach people to think on the pitch when they do almost no thinking off it. If you really want a dominant team, start a youth academy that encourages education and sports theory, coaching concepts, training the mind as well as the body. You could get far more interesting players out of the system for it, imo.