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?
seriously, it only worked because the players had high technical ability to retain the ball long enough to advance and the formidable Drogba as an outlet.