Tactics for next year and the sacrifice of David Silva

[JamesA]

Might as well sack Mancini as well, get Joe Royle in and go back to being shite, there is a recurring theme with teams that play the 'winger' mentality.

Barcelona, Real Madrid, Chelsea, PSG, Juventus, Napoli, Malaga, Athletico, Milan all manage without wingers.

That is an amazing post.

Barcelona a team with Alexis & Pedro, Madrid with Ronaldo & Di Maria, Chelsea with Hazard & Moses, PSG with Lavezzi & Lucas all apparently play without wingers.

Yep, he hasn't got a fuckin clue that lad!!!

 

[A man called sun]

Get rid of Mancini not Silva!

 

[JamesA]

I agree what you're saying formation-wise, i think we should play one striker, Silva in behind and 1-2 wide midfielders a la Hazard/Walcott.

I certainly don't think we should be sacrificing Silva though, no way!

This One strikerwith silva or yaya in behind. Should be like that rest of season

Do you think this side will got the goals though?. The year we won the cup we played this way with Mancini identifying we needed more goals in the side, hence the signing of Aguero and a huge leap in the number of points and goals resulting in last seasons championship.

I don't think we should play like that for rest of season, quite simply because we don't have the personnel for it. Aguero has, and always will, be a striker. He is just patched onto that side of the pitch, square peg in a round hole for me.

 

[ElanJo]

Sell Silva? No.

Just no.

 

[ChicagoBlue]

Seems to me that we "sacrifice" the team sometimes by not playing with only ONE DM across the front of the back four, and "wasting" a player there. Accordingly, as the game goes on, we turn into an "attack vs defense" team, where it is the back four and two DMS versus the opposition attack, and we have FOUR players who ALL hang around upfront.

We need to have the personnel to be able to play the 4-1-4-1/4-1-3-2/3-3-3-1 formations that can REALLY adapt to the challenges posed by the opposition or the occasion. We don't, at present. Sadly, much as I like Garcia, he is going to need to have an outstanding pre-season that helps him increase his fitness level and quickness over the first 5 yards.

For Silva to be truly effective, he needs a "FREE" role. How you provide him a free role in a team that seems to believe 3 or 4 players have free roles over the course of the game! As we all saw today, giving him the responsibility to track a full back is asking for trouble.....and we got it ALL DAY TODAY!

We are in desperate need of a left footed James Milner. Thought Kolarov MIGHT be able to turn himself into that type of player (work down the line, get your tackles in in midfield, and cover your attacking full back) but he seems to lazy to WANT to do it.

All of that said, some days, David needs to have a rest and understand it is just not his kind of game....UNLESS he is willing to put in a shift, which he is on occasion. Today was not one of those occasions, unfortunately.

 

[Dave Ewing's Back 'eader]

WE need a supplement, or complement to David Silva. He's one of two who is charged or can deliver any creativity. Yaya is the other.

 

[franksinatra]

This One strikerwith silva or yaya in behind. Should be like that rest of season

Do you think this side will got the goals though?. The year we won the cup we played this way with Mancini identifying we needed more goals in the side, hence the signing of Aguero and a huge leap in the number of points and goals resulting in last seasons championship.

I don't think we should play like that for rest of season, quite simply because we don't have the personnel for it. Aguero has, and always will, be a striker. He is just patched onto that side of the pitch, square peg in a round hole for me.

That is the issue the personnel. I think we still need to go with two upfront this year. But in the summer to play the formation with wingers and a player in the pocket will require three new signings. It would be quite a gamble recruiting players of the required quality and them all bedding in successfully.

I thought Hazard would have ripped the Prem up this year but has not proved consistent. If we did go with one in the hole next year and two wingers who could we realistically sign?<br /><br />-- Sat Mar 16, 2013 3:49 pm --<br /><br />

WE need a supplement, or complement to David Silva. He's one of two who is charged or can deliver any creativity. Yaya is the other.

So do we give him a free role behind the striker? Even though is finishing is poor. Continue with the same formation next year and therefore the same problems e.g lack of width? Lose Milner or Nasri and pick up one winger and if so who?

 

[BlueEagle]

Silva is at his best when he can run in the space between the midfield and defence, and there's very few players in the world who are as threatening as him at picking out a brilliant pass. Even today he created some great chances that were wasted. The problem is that we don't often see Silva in this area much any more, because the way we change from defence to attack is so slow. In the first half today every time we won the ball back in our own half, we either gave it away quickly or passed it back to Hart who would inevitably give away possession.

We've had this problem for a while now, and I believe it's why Mancini opts to play Yaya further back, as he's the only midfield player who has the ability to pick the ball up, hold off any pressure, and play the ball to one of our players. Unfortunately, Touré doesn't do enough work defensively, so we can often get overrun in midfield when another team tries to pressure us high up the pitch (like Dortmund or even Liverpool recently).

Really, I believe we need more technically sound central midfielders who can help us dominate and control the game, and perhaps more wide, faster players who would often run in behind or just generally help to generate space for the rest of our team. At the moment when a team pressures us, we don't have the passing or movement that is required to escape through the pressure, and until we fix that we will always struggle away from home and against other top teams. Silva would be brilliant if he had them type of players around him, as he is for Spain and would be for a team like Barcelona.

 

[Bozzie]

It's not wingers we need, we need pace. The number of times a counter attack is there for the taking and we fuck it up is unbelievable

.

The lack of pace has been so obvious this season. Today our midfield consisted of Kolaov, Barry, Garcia and Milner. Hardly the most mobile combo in the PL, Milner and Barry will never short change you on effort but they have little in the way of creativity. Kolarov and Garcia just don't cut it for me and don't even hide their deficiencies with hard work. David Silva, I believe, needs a free role, playing behind strikers that have pace and movement. That would appear to rule out Dzeko on both counts.

 

[guvnors son mcfc]

One of the main reasons we have fallen behind in the race for the championship is our inability to score resulting in defeats to the like of Everton, Sunderland and draws at places like QPR, West Ham, and Chelsea.

Consistently these teams have defended deep, with the lack of width in the side resulting in continual failed attempts to play through the middle of these sides particularly away from home rather than the wide open spaces of Eastland’s.

By playing Silva and two strikers we seem straight jacketed in the way we play as he will never be the type of player to hog the touchline, continually moving inside resulting in even less spaces in central areas and even less width in the side.

Arsenal and Chelsea generally operate with one striker a player of David Silva's ilk in the space behind and the width operated by the Hazards and Walcott’s of this world. My concern is if we employed this formation Silva would not contribute the goals of a Mata or Cazorla and so the problem of failing to score would be exacerbated.

Therefore my question would be should we gamble in the transfer window on losing a fantastic player like David Silva next year, whose form has admittedly dipped over the past year and recoup a decent fee enabling us to buy one or two top class player and play two wingers to provide the width, operate one striker with David Silva in the space behind or purchase one winger and lose a Nasri or Milner?

The context of the thread is not to criticise David Silva but to debate the way we play as it seems consistently we struggle to score away from home and the tactics and personnel seem a large part of this.

The main reason is that Van Persie is lethal and has scored goals to secure three points in games that our strikers haven't. They also have the threat of Rooney, the pace of Nani, Young plus that little mexican and Wellbeck who are happy to sit and come in when required. They have more options going forward and that is what wins games and gets three points. We have the better defence as the the stats and clean sheets will prove.

Dzeko is not good enough, Aguero has had a stop / start season with injury and Tevez has only just got going two thirds into the season. Ballotelli never turned up all season and neither has Nasri. Our main player Yaya having two months away to play in a shite competition and our captain and leader being injured for long periods are the main reasons.