As well as the issues I was experiencing with width, the other factor in my decision to look at our tactics again was
that we were getting a lot of possession with the 4-3-1-2 but not a lot of
penetration. I actually got criticised by the fans for a negative approach,
which seemed off given that it was our only 2-striker formation, it had an AMC
in behind, and I was encouraging a number of players forward. It’s seemed
likely that the issue was down to individual roles/instructions though.
A brief conversation with @RTHerringbone ensued, and he
explained how he’d been playing with 4-1-4-1 and 4-4-1-1 shapes, functioning with a lone striker. His outlook seemed to be a combination of ‘back to basics’
and giving players the licence to make their own decisions; it was very light
on specialised roles and that appealed to me, although given the personnel at
hand I could imagine mixing it up a bit.
Looking at the options I had in central midfield positions, I
considered my approach to such a formation and arrived at the conclusion that I
could look to build a fairly uniform 4-4-1, leaving me a ‘floating’ player to
deploy as most appropriate. A DMC would help against shapes like the 4-2-3-1,
whilst someone like Coco sitting in the hole behind the striker would add to
our attack where viable. If it came to it I could always run with two strikers,
although I still have a (completely unjustified) dislike for the bog-standard
4-4-2.
If my wide midfield men, who are mostly more suited to the
AM strata, could supply from a deeper position then this could well be the
shape for me – and as you can see from the Tweet exchange above, I'd started to see encouraging signs.
It took a few matches of tweaking until I arrived at these starting setups. The
graphic shows a default approach of Fluid/Control, but at the time I’d
initially gone with a Balanced/Standard as I looked to find my feet.
The intention, in either case, is to adopt an approach of “Aggressive
containment” – pushing the defensive line forward, and playing at a higher
tempo. Not quite the ‘High Pressing’ game so favoured by top flight teams, but
certainly intended to put pressure on the opposition to defend.
The wide positions are fairly consistent, but you’ll see
that the two central midfield spots – along with the floating man – give plenty
of opportunity to mix things up, and I did. After a few games bedding in the
4-4-1-1 we played host to Dijon FCO, and I wrote up the following at the
time...
ANALYSING THE 4-1-4-1
So here we are, nine games into the 2015/16 season and
preparing to face Dijon FCO who currently sit one spot above us in 3rd.
it’s our chance to break into the top three spots, and we’re coming into the
game on the back of three matches in each of which we’ve scored three times.
The first of those was a crazy game against Auxerre, we
played the 4-1-2-2-1 as a defensive shape as the visitors piled on the
pressure. We scored from our only three on-target chances, whilst they
squandered good chances and tried to literally batter us into submission; how
they escaped with 11 men, and only two bookings, after 21 fouls is beyond me.
The next two games saw us employing the 4-4-1-1 formation,
which by now was showing signs of working well. As something of an experiment,
for the trip to Angers SCO, I switched up from Balanced/Standard to
Attacking/Fluid (just call me Newcastle-era Keegan) and we hit them hard whilst
still retaining an impressive 60% of possession.
I would’ve liked to take that shape into this game too, but
it’s our first time facing off against a 4-2-3-1 since my new(est) approach so
it feels like 4-1-4-1 may be the better option, dropping a Ball Winning
Midfielder into the space in front of our back four.
Clearly there’s little doubt that 4-2-3-1 will be their
approach, and I’m not spotting any obvious weaknesses (goals conceded) or
preferred outlets (scored). That’s actually quite pleasing, as I’d prefer to go
into this one with a fairly ‘standard’ tactic and adapt as we go.
In terms of squad depth...
They’re a strong looking side, at least in comparison to us,
and I’d bet that they’re going to cover all of their places with those players.
The nearest thing I see to a weak point is the MC positions where, if we’re
very lucky, there might be a slightly weaker man deployed. My presumption would
be that they’ll go with Rakotoharisoa and Perez, with Aho Abou at AM(R), that’s
what I’d probably do but when I take a look at their previous matches I notice
that their 3 in the 4-2-3-1 is actually a very compact and narrow one.
For their last game they actually played Remy as an MC which
seems strange, especially as their only major injury loss is another DC (not
listed above). Michel anchored their AM line, flanked by Bouadla (so-so) and
Perez (not even ranked in the AM part of the chart). I’m sure that their
manager knows what he’s doing, if they’re going to present the same against us,
but I’ll admit I’m a little confused.
Their back line is entirely as expected though, and I’ll assume that I’ll be facing the same. There’s nothing immediately obvious to exploit there, but I will look to pressure their forwards somewhat through Grimm (BWM-D) and Dembele as a ‘Stopper’.
I won’t reproduce all of the screens from the scout report,
but will mention that Pace comparisons between their Attack (11.00) and our defence
(11.56), and the corresponding details for our front line (10.67) and their
back four (12.29). Not likely to be much joy for strikers to chase a long ball
then.
Finally, and I’ll stress that this is not something I often
do, I take a look at some of the action from their last match. The main reason
for doing so is that it was a home game which they lost 4-1, and it was against
Angers SCO – who we’d comprehensively beaten a week before.
Possession was fairly even in that game, but Dijon only put
a single shot on target. Their opponents scored from two quick breaks down the
middle, a corner (directly into the net!), and a good cross for glancing header. Again no one specific
weakness, but I will probably see how things go and consider encouraging play
through the middle if it looks like the way to go.
So far I’m looking at vanilla tactics then, my basic 4-1-4-1
formation looking like this...
In terms of Player Instructions there are a few, mainly
similar to the 4-1-2-2-1 covered last time out, as this is
essentially the same shape but with the wide men dropped deeper. Again I’ll be
adapting as we go. We’re missing Joey Barton in midfield, which is a bit of a
blow as he was one of the architects of the Angers SCO win, but we’ll see how
things play out.
Dijon line up exactly as they did against Angers, so given
our respective results against the same side I’m optimistic.
KICK-OFF
Dijon make a forward move right from the kick-off, and it’s
immediately obvious that at least one of their wide defenders is fulfilling a
wingback role – getting well forward and potentially leaving us space to
exploit out wide. My initial thoughts of going through the middle are put on
the backburner until we see how frequent a move this will be.
My first ‘WTF’ moment comes here, less than a minute in,
when we turn over possession and Chere decides that a lofted cross-field ball
to our striker is viable.
Not the greatest cross-field ball in history.
It’s easily picked off, but comes to nothing for them. I’ll
let it slide this time, as it’s early doors and he is meant to be playing a
creative role, but it’s something to keep an eye on.
1m 57s on the clock.
Another early concern pops up when Bauer (circled -
theoretically the more withdrawn of our DC pairing) steps out to try and close
down one of their three AMCs, the result is an easy through-ball for their striker to latch onto. Bauer
quickly recovers ground, and we end up with a goal kick, but for the time being
I notch Bauer back to a ‘Cover’ duty whilst we settle down.
The ball is played around for a while, with a couple of half-breaks either
way, and it gives me a chance to take stock of how things are shaping up in
general play.
I’m liking our positions here, as Perez (MC-R) receives the
ball from their right wingback. Our back four aren’t flat, and there’s no need
for them to be against this shape; instead we’ve got Bauer tracking their
striker and Dembele free to fulfil his stopper role if necessary.
Grimm is tight in on Michel, which could prove to be a key
battle, and with our fullbacks sitting forward a little we’re well placed to
press the ball from both front and back. Perez isn’t exactly forced to play it
backwards, but that’s what he opts for and again we turn it over.
So far so good then, now we need to start probing for gaps
in their back line. With Mustafi pulling to a deep position, and a sizeable gap
between their midfield and defence, it feels like we ought to be able to.
See notes below for each of these 4 highlights
HIGHLIGHT #1 : Just what I’m wanting to see, Coco drops in to help with defence, then breaks quickly – along with Ferri, to support a quick counter. Chere’s ball is better this time, and Ferri’s header is a great idea – just a touch on the heavy side, but it’s good stuff and I’m happy with the way we’re playing in the early stages. Nothing jumps out in terms of changes that I need to consider just yet.
There’s not a lot to say about our opener when it comes, a
ridiculous backpass from their midfield gifts us a free corner and it’s a
simple near-post header from Dembele that puts us in front. We’ve hardly bossed
possession, but we have notched another couple of promising moves similar to
that above. At the back, we’ve needed to do nothing other than remain
organised.
What’s really pleasing is seeing the play up front in terms
of interchanges though, I think I’d previously got a bit too hung up on
specialised roles and rigid styles, thinking that they were the way to go with
a lesser quality team. I’m actually beginning to think that you need really
high quality players to make the most of a more rigid approach, and that using
more generic Roles and a more Fluid approach allows players of this level to do
something unexpected and give the defence some problems – as evidenced when
Chere ends up in almost an AMC-R position to curl a shot just wide of the post.
As the half wears on we’re barely troubled at the back, Dijon
continue to play a fairly short-passing game and struggle to produce an
incisive ball. I’m already thinking that I might tweak at half time, pushing
Grimm into the central midfield (retaining the BWM-D) and Coco into the AM
strata to make a 4-4-1-1.
A number of breaks have seen us pump balls forward a little
more than I like, so I add the Retain Possession shout for now, but it would be
good to have Coco that little further forward where Mustafi could consider a
knock-down for him. It also reinforces the idea that I had in the summer, that
a genuinely quick forward player would be a great addition for us.
HIGHLIGHT #2 : First up in the above is a quick and simple counter, with the sort of through-ball that I’ve been striving for. As per the Player Instructions previously outlined, Laoudihi has ‘Roam from Position’ and it’s good to see that this has some impact, despite his PPM of ‘Runs Down the Right with the Ball’
HIGHLIGHT #3 : What’s really pleasing here is some high-tempo, but patient, build up play on the right flank. Nice interchanged passes as we work our way up the pitch, and then a fantastic penetrating run from Laoudihi again.
HIGHLIGHT 4 : Although I’d considered pushing him into midfield, Grimm ultimately remained in the deeper position. Whilst he’s been solid throughout, when he is a little slow to close down you can see the danger of the quick ball (from Michel) when given space. It’s a mild concern, but I’m not unhappy with our efforts to recover – even Coco races back from midfield to help.
At 58 minutes I drop the tempo a little, and start to think who I’d like to introduce for some game time. Things are going smoothly and I don’t feel like I need to make any tactical change at this point, in fact it’s not until 66 minutes that our visitors put a shot on target. A good cross into a crowded box, which their striker gets a head on, but he’s well marked and it’s an easy catch for our Keeper.
68 minutes in and, with no significant threats to our lead,
I’m happy to use our last two subs in like-for-like swaps to give more second-string
players some game time. It’s around that point that Dijon seem to start pushing
on more, in response I increase tempo again, and add ‘Exploit the Flanks’ and ‘Clear
to Flanks’, whilst dropping from Control
to Standard. The aim now is simply to make use of the space we have out wide
and gain some ‘easy’ possession, giving Grimm and our DC
pairing more time to regain their shape and settle as we clear our lines.
Statistically it’s hardly a one-sided affair, and they create a couple of
decent chances late on, but the only statistic that really counts is goals; there's nothing from them that really sets alarm bells ringing
despite the suggestion of two clear-cut chances.
What didn’t help them, particularly early on, was their
Keeper’s distribution. I lost count of the number of long kicks I saw drifting out
of play on their left. I’ve watched the video back and I still don’t know who
he was trying to find – I can only assume it was someone in the stands.
The really interesting thing on the stats front is this
though...
Only a single tackle between our DC pairing, albeit a key one, but the Interceptions – and particularly the fantastic aerial dominance – are such that both end up in the Team of the Week. I love having a couple of proper big men at the back, even if they’re not cut out for playing the ball out particularly elegantly.
Those two formations are the foundation of our season then,
and I’ll update on just how the season went soon. In the meantime, as usual, feel free to drop any observations or questions in the Comments, or catch me on Twitter : @flipsix3_FM
No comments:
Post a Comment