whitestrat
New member
- Dec 19, 2012
- 9
Hello Everyone
I’m a long time viewer of NSC but I’ve never got round to posting before – mainly because there’s always such a variety of views on offer that any point I’d like to make gets made by someone else before I feel the need to register and post myself.
One thing I have noticed, however, is the number of posters who seem convinced that 4-4-2 is the answer to us turning from an upper mid-table team to real challengers for promotion. The ‘team for x’ threads always have loads of people who think 2 up front is the answer for our goal scoring problems and the ‘which striker should we buy’ ones seem to have many posters arguing for a partner for CMS rather than a replacement (or at least competition).
Many football writers / managers have argued that 4-4-2 is becoming redundant in the modern game (rather than it just being a formation that Gus ‘refuses’ to play out of some sort of stubbornness). In the last 10-20 years the changing modern interpretation of the offside law has allowed strikers to hang around in an offside position, knowing they won’t be penalised unless a ball is actually played directly to them. This has allowed them to position themselves further forward and come on side just at the right time (Van Nistleroy was a master of this). Defenders have therefore had to play deeper to counter this and a wider gap has consequently appeared between a team’s defence and attack.
Playing 4-4-2 means that there are only 2 central midfielders in a large gap, who are at risk of being overrun. Teams therefore need to set up with 4 lines of outfield players rather than the traditional three to avoid this gap, perhaps explaining why most successful teams play a 4-2-3-1 type formation, or at least 4-3-3 / 4-5-1 with central midfielders having a distinct midfield role (e.g. holding midfielder or attacking midfielder / ‘no.10’). Man City won the title last season with 4-2-3-1 and Chelsea won the European Cup with the same formation. Barcelona play with 1 centre forward, as have all the Mourinho teams. In fact, I can’t think of a modern successful team that plays 4-4-2.
In my opinion, I really don’t think 4-4-2 would work for us at all. Bridcutt would become isolated as the sole defensive midfielder, and if Hammond / Crofts / whoever came deep to help, the strikers would end up with no service as there’d be a huge gap between the strikers and midfielders. Taking chances wouldn’t be the problem so much as creating them.
Sorry for the essay – got a bit carried away with my first post! Anyone else agree that 4-4-2 is not the answer, or can anyone argue why they think that we could make it work with our players?
I’m a long time viewer of NSC but I’ve never got round to posting before – mainly because there’s always such a variety of views on offer that any point I’d like to make gets made by someone else before I feel the need to register and post myself.
One thing I have noticed, however, is the number of posters who seem convinced that 4-4-2 is the answer to us turning from an upper mid-table team to real challengers for promotion. The ‘team for x’ threads always have loads of people who think 2 up front is the answer for our goal scoring problems and the ‘which striker should we buy’ ones seem to have many posters arguing for a partner for CMS rather than a replacement (or at least competition).
Many football writers / managers have argued that 4-4-2 is becoming redundant in the modern game (rather than it just being a formation that Gus ‘refuses’ to play out of some sort of stubbornness). In the last 10-20 years the changing modern interpretation of the offside law has allowed strikers to hang around in an offside position, knowing they won’t be penalised unless a ball is actually played directly to them. This has allowed them to position themselves further forward and come on side just at the right time (Van Nistleroy was a master of this). Defenders have therefore had to play deeper to counter this and a wider gap has consequently appeared between a team’s defence and attack.
Playing 4-4-2 means that there are only 2 central midfielders in a large gap, who are at risk of being overrun. Teams therefore need to set up with 4 lines of outfield players rather than the traditional three to avoid this gap, perhaps explaining why most successful teams play a 4-2-3-1 type formation, or at least 4-3-3 / 4-5-1 with central midfielders having a distinct midfield role (e.g. holding midfielder or attacking midfielder / ‘no.10’). Man City won the title last season with 4-2-3-1 and Chelsea won the European Cup with the same formation. Barcelona play with 1 centre forward, as have all the Mourinho teams. In fact, I can’t think of a modern successful team that plays 4-4-2.
In my opinion, I really don’t think 4-4-2 would work for us at all. Bridcutt would become isolated as the sole defensive midfielder, and if Hammond / Crofts / whoever came deep to help, the strikers would end up with no service as there’d be a huge gap between the strikers and midfielders. Taking chances wouldn’t be the problem so much as creating them.
Sorry for the essay – got a bit carried away with my first post! Anyone else agree that 4-4-2 is not the answer, or can anyone argue why they think that we could make it work with our players?