Three In Midfield

[Damocles]

Can I just point out here that Real Madrid and Bayern Munich have all done well in Europe over the last couple of years using a pretty traditional 4-4-2?

I can't understand why people are so afraid of it as a formation, as if it is some backwards English tradition that needs to be stamped out for the health of the nation. It's just a formation.

 

[Wilf Wild 1937]

Can I just point out here that Real Madrid and Bayern Munich have all done well in Europe over the last couple of years using a pretty traditional 4-4-2?

I can't understand why people are so afraid of it as a formation, as if it is some backwards English tradition that needs to be stamped out for the health of the nation. It's just a formation.

Bayern battered us at the Etihad last season effectively playing 6 in midfield with a false number 9.
At times it was like watching 9 v 11.

 

[sh249]

Every top European team and pretty much every CL winning team for the last decade embraces this tired cliche

Mainly because top class forwards are the most expensive players on the market and it's rare that clubs find themselves with four of them and the capacity to rotate and still play two up top each week.

I believe when the players apply Pellegrini's system and do their jobs properly (as per Chelsea at home) then it is almost impossible for the opposition no matter how good they are to deal with us.

He is a vastly experienced deeply thoughtful manager and coach and I find it almost impossible to believe he just wakes up on each match day and goes "right, 442, lets fucking have them". There are subtleties to any system which the naked eye doesn't see and in particular the system we play is so complex at times that it bares little or no resemblance to the traditional 442.

The two striker option at the Etihad is fundamental to how we play, its ingrained in us. The big wins last season against United, Arsenal & Spurs, against Liverpool this season, were largely because their defenses couldn't cope with the space created by our two strikers. Even last night the penalty was won because Aguero was left one on one with Maicon, something that would never have happened if we had only been playing with one striker. The last time we started with a single striker at home was against Villa, a game that was 0-0 after an hour, at which point we brought on a 2nd striker.

442 isnt going to do it in the CL. But its not going to do it if we persist with two strikers at home in the PL but switch to one in the CL. Its too big a change, we would need to radically change our build up play to make it work. Its no more likely to work than if we play a back 4 in the PL, 3 at the back in the CL.

Chelsea will play 4-2-3-1 in nearly every game this season, home and away, PL and CL, The only exception would be if Costa is unavailable and they are playing away in a game when a point would do, in which case they might play a false 9. Mourinho will tinker with his side, might play Fabregas further forward in some games than other. But all of Mourinho's famed tactical flexibility will take place within the confines of a formation that works in any competition.

If we are to be successful in the CL we need to find a system that works in both competitions.

I think there's a lot of truth in that. Switching to playing 1 upfront in Europe is all well and good, but it has the effect that (1) we become pretty toothless and (2) the players go into the game with the mentality that they have to change what they do usually, which puts us on the back foot from the off.

With regards the system, I wouldn't say playing 2 in midfield and two up top cannot work full stop, and I'll wager that a lot of those who are saying as much were also up in arms when they saw the line-up for the Chelsea game, which we then dominated playing precisley that way. The problem is more that we struggle with Yaya in a two against sides who, like Roma, press well (Chelsea sit much deeper, and that allowed Yaya much more time on the ball). As many (most?) of the top sides in Europe play that way, it's a huge issue for us. Watching sides like Roma also hammers home each time how ridiculously poor we are at pressing as a team, which is another big contributing factor to why we struggle so badly against the top sides.

For what it's worth, I'd like to see us play a 4-3-1-2 with Silva in behind Aguero and Dzeko/Jovetic (or even a kind of 4-3-2-1 with Silva and Jovetic slightly behind Aguero). We're at our best with two strikers/forwards, and we've got arguably the best No. 10 in the world, so we should play to those strengths. We don't have great wide players, and most of our (effective) width comes from the fullbacks anyway. The midfield three can then be permed from Toure, Fernandinho, Fernando, Milner, even Lampard.

 

[BobKowalski]

Can I just point out here that Real Madrid and Bayern Munich have all done well in Europe over the last couple of years using a pretty traditional 4-4-2?

I can't understand why people are so afraid of it as a formation, as if it is some backwards English tradition that needs to be stamped out for the health of the nation. It's just a formation.

Not sure its the formation as such but the balance. If you had Silva playing off Dzeko with Fernando or Lamps in midfield with Yaya and Dinho and Milner/Navas on the flanks its still 442 but a better balanced 442. Equally pre game I was relaxed about playing Edin and Sergio. Roma had a lot of key absentees and we should have been capable of exploiting that. Unfortunately we did not bring the necessary application and belief to the game to make that line up work. What we needed was more bodies in midfield to make up for the drop off in the collective performance. I presume Pellers stayed his hand in the hope that the collective effort would rise to the challenge except it didn't and the whole sorry tale played out before us.

Personally I like the one out and out striker option however we have played with two strikers since the 2011 season and it has worked so there is nothing wrong with the system or formation as long as the balance is right or the necessary application is put in to make it work or preferably both. In Europe we just don't strike the right note. Mancini tried 352 to get the extra body in midfield and stay with two strikers which was fine in theory just not so much in practice. Pellers has also yet to find the right note in Europe but in my view its less about formations then the self doubt that exists in the players collective heads. Basically we own the PL. The PL is our woman. The CL? We just wet our collective pants.

 

[cleavers]

Can we please but this tired cliche to bed. Every week last season and seemingly every week this season people post "we better play three in midfield this week or we'll get overrun". We get overrun when the players don't do their jobs collectively at pressing when we don't have the ball.

In my eyes the ideal of the system we play is some sort of 4312 with one of the wide players stepping into the middle and the other stepping into the hole. Whether it's Silva/Nasri or Silva/Milner or Silva/Navas the jobs of all the players remain the same and they all have the tactical flexibility to play in all those positions in midfield.

Every top European team and pretty much every CL winning team for the last decade embraces this tired cliche

Mainly because top class forwards are the most expensive players on the market and it's rare that clubs find themselves with four of them and the capacity to rotate and still play two up top each week.

I believe when the players apply Pellegrini's system and do their jobs properly (as per Chelsea at home) then it is almost impossible for the opposition no matter how good they are to deal with us.

He is a vastly experienced deeply thoughtful manager and coach and I find it almost impossible to believe he just wakes up on each match day and goes "right, 442, lets fucking have them". There are subtleties to any system which the naked eye doesn't see and in particular the system we play is so complex at times that it bares little or no resemblance to the traditional 442.

The problem last night wasn't necessarily the formation, or the subtelties of it, for most of the first half, it was that we couldn't keep the ball, Roma were at us so quickly once we had the ball, our passing went to pot, and we failed to retain the ball until the final 5 minutes. Navas worked hard, but he was a part of the problem, much as he was against Bayern at home last year, when he offered little support to Zab, while on the other side silva offered little help to Clichy, who was having an off night anyway, and it was clear after 20 minutes that we needed to change something. We'd had enough warnings by that point that Roma were a good side, pressing hard, and giving Yaya, and Fernandhino in particular, nowhere to go. The two up front also worked hard, with lots of making of space, but they needed to do more of their shift in midfield, and neither did, and while the space they made was good, we rarely had the ball to utilise it.

Milner made us better, Lampard made us tick, and Roma knew it, so they pretty well reverted to being "Stoke" in the second half, to preserve their point.

On top of that, we gifted another team a goal, where they had to do little or nothing to score it, which is pretty frustrating too.

Like you I'm not that worried about formations, but players need to do their jobs better, and one thing we are normally good at, but weren't in the first half last night, is keeping the ball, even under pressure, and we weren't helped by a couple of players being well off their best, especially in the passing department.

I can see us winning out there, because we will adapt the way we play, and we're unlikely to pass the ball as poorly as we did for the 25 minutes after we took the early lead. I also don't think Roma can improve much, but I know we can.

Long way to go in this group yet.

 

[BillyShears]

The problem last night wasn't necessarily the formation, or the subtelties of it, for most of the first half, it was that we couldn't keep the ball, Roma were at us so quickly once we had the ball, our passing went to pot, and we failed to retain the ball until the final 5 minutes. Navas worked hard, but he was a part of the problem, much as he was against Bayern at home last year, when he offered little support to Zab, while on the other side silva offered little help to Clichy, who was having an off night anyway, and it was clear after 20 minutes that we needed to change something. We'd had enough warnings by that point that Roma were a good side, pressing hard, and giving Yaya, and Fernandhino in particular, nowhere to go. The two up front also worked hard, with lots of making of space, but they needed to do more of their shift in midfield, and neither did, and while the space they made was good, we rarely had the ball to utilise it.

Milner made us better, Lampard made us tick, and Roma knew it, so they pretty well reverted to being "Stoke" in the second half, to preserve their point.

On top of that, we gifted another team a goal, where they had to do little or nothing to score it, which is pretty frustrating too.

Like you I'm not that worried about formations, but players need to do their jobs better, and one thing we are normally good at, but weren't in the first half last night, is keeping the ball, even under pressure, and we weren't helped by a couple of players being well off their best, especially in the passing department.

I can see us winning out there, because we will adapt the way we play, and we're unlikely to pass the ball as poorly as we did for the 25 minutes after we took the early lead. I also don't think Roma can improve much, but I know we can.

Long way to go in this group yet.

Cracking post. Agree with nearly all of what you say.

It does really come down to the fact that the players collectively just weren't good enough at doing the basics. It happens from time to time.

 

[inbetween]

Playing the two strikers is fine when you are playing West Ham or something because these teams drop into their own box and we get all the possession and complete freedom in the middle. When you are playing a team like Roma who can keep the ball and hurt you on the break, you simply cannot afford to be outnumbered because there will always be a gap for a player to move into. If you want to see what 2 strikers versus decent teams gets you in European football, the game against Bayern last year is a pretty good example.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3ryuRDiBpg[/youtube]

 

[Deleted member 58678]

Can I just point out here that Real Madrid and Bayern Munich have all done well in Europe over the last couple of years using a pretty traditional 4-4-2?

I can't understand why people are so afraid of it as a formation, as if it is some backwards English tradition that needs to be stamped out for the health of the nation. It's just a formation.

Bayern battered us at the Etihad last season effectively playing 6 in midfield with a false number 9.
At times it was like watching 9 v 11.

With Muller dropping deep and the full backs pushing up, they then sat Lahm back with the two centre halves, and their formation was a 3-7. and we had 4 in midfield, against 7!

I was like watching an under 9s play an under 11s team, never mind 9 v11 of grown men!

 

[abu13]

I know that Clichey didn't have the best of games but the formation left him out to dry last night, because the midfield was being over run Silva hsd to keep cutting into the middle. This left him totally exposed.

the best way to stop us is to negate our full backs, last night showed this clear enough.

for me I think we need to go 4 2 3 1 in future and Milner has to be in there.

 

[abu13]

I know that Clichey didn't have the best of games but the formation left him out to dry last night, because the midfield was being over run Silva hsd to keep cutting into the middle. This left him totally exposed.

the best way to stop us is to negate our full backs, last night showed this clear enough.

for me I think we need to go 4 2 3 1 in future and Milner has to be in there.