Examples of Back 3s with attacking LCB and/or RCB

Physiocrat

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A notable tactical arrangement with the current England side is that the central CB in the back 3 stays back and the liberoish role is shared between LCB and RCB.

I think Bayern under Pep used Alaba as a LCB libero of sorts for a time but that's the only other one I know of.

Are there any other examples of conservative central CBs and attacking LCB and/or RCBs in a back 3?
 
For Wales we've been playing Ben Davies as 1 of our 3 centre backs for the last few years.

Wouldn't be surprised if that's where Southgate got the idea from to play Walker there.
 
JamesO said:
For Wales we've been playing Ben Davies as 1 of our 3 centre backs for the last few years.

Wouldn't be surprised if that's where Southgate got the idea from to play Walker there.
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He probably got the idea from Chelsea who were playing Azpi as one of the CBs.
 
Playig full backs as centre backs in a 3 is nothing new and certainly didnt start with Chelsea or Wales. The best example I can think of is Cruyff with Barcelona in the early 90's. Ferrer and Sergi (amongst others) would traditionally have be been full backs but were employed as the RCB and LCB and were instructed to get forward to create numerical advantages and to tire out the strikers who would then subsequently have to track them.
 
Yacono, Vaghi and Ferreryra did something similar with river plate back in the day
 
De Boer was the most attacking of the three in 1995 LVG's Ajax

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Most famous example in English football is the England team itself in world cup 98.

Back three of Neville - Campbell - Adams after the first game (where Neville came in for Southgate).

England played a 3-5-2. Beckham came in after the 2nd game in a centre-ish position. Owen came in from the 3rd game

So Southgates 2018 England immitates the 1998 England side he played in 20 years earlier. The biggest difference is the front line, where in 1998 there was a front three of Shearer - Owen/Sherringham - Scholes (as the AM) in 2008 we basically had one central striker (Sterling) with three attacking midfielders behind him (Kane, Alli, Lingard). And even then Kane was acting more as the playmaker.

Yeah I don't understand either. Seemed to work for a while
 
rcoobc said:
Most famous example in English football is the England team itself in world cup 98.

Back three of Neville - Campbell - Adams after the first game (where Neville came in for Southgate).

England played a 3-5-2. Beckham came in after the 2nd game in a centre-ish position. Owen came in from the 3rd game

So Southgates 2018 England immitates the 1998 England side he played in 20 years earlier. The biggest difference is the front line, where in 1998 there was a front three of Shearer - Owen/Sherringham - Scholes (as the AM) in 2008 we basically had one central striker (Sterling) with three attacking midfielders behind him (Kane, Alli, Lingard). And even then Kane was acting more as the playmaker.

Yeah I don't understand either. Seemed to work for a while
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Neither was that attacking tho?

Even Neville didn't have much contribution going forward at the time.
 
Enigma_87 said:
Neither was that attacking tho?

Even Neville didn't have much contribution going forward at the time.
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I mean, if the claim is that Walker and Maguire are some sort of marauding defensive attacking defenders, I don't accept that.

Maguire brought the ball forward yes. But so do many modern ball-playing defenders.

Walker acted as cover for Trippier (which meant Walker was often out of position) which let Trippier get forward.. but Walker didn't get forward that much really.
 
Gio said:
Quite easy to defend against when there’s only one of the three who overloads.
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Yeah. I guess one of the ideas behind this is to keep the strikers chasing behind the overloading defender. Much more work for them if there's a threat on both sides. Ideally you probably want the central CB who can ping the ball around to really make the whole system really fluid.
 
Physiocrat said:
A notable tactical arrangement with the current England side is that the central CB in the back 3 stays back and the liberoish role is shared between LCB and RCB.

I think Bayern under Pep used Alaba as a LCB libero of sorts for a time but that's the only other one I know of.

Are there any other examples of conservative central CBs and attacking LCB and/or RCBs in a back 3?
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Physiocrat said:
True, but normally with a 352 it is the central CB.
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Is it even the case that it is normally the central centre back that is roaming/ adventurous/ ball-playing in nature? There is no reason why that would be the case. How does a team benefit more from having a central playmaker in the backline?
 
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sherrinford said:
Is it even the case that it is normally the central centre back that is roaming/ adventurous/ ball-playing in nature? There is no reason why that would be the case. How does a team benefit more from having a central playmaker in the backline?
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In the old 352 that's how it was played, two stoppers and a libero in the centre. A good example is Germany Euro 96 with Sammer.

I think the idea is that the libero is a playmaker from deep and being in the centre gives you more passing options than being wider.
 
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