Formation or players?

[AngeloHenriquez]

Something that has always bothered me and I'm sure many others is "Shoehorning" players into an XI to fit them in, which begs the question, do we decide on a formation and then fit the players in or do we decide who our best few players are and fit the formation to that?

Ole clearly prefers the 4-2-3-1 yet we have Pogba who I think fits best as a Mezzala or left of a diamond, so we shoehorn him in a #6 position.

The other method suggests that our best/ most stocked area is the non defensive midfielders, now Pogba, Fernandes & VDB, surely a diamond would fit them better with Matic at the base.

Question is then, do you fit the formation around your players or fit your players into the formation?

 

[Glideman]

Something that has always bothered me and I'm sure many others is "Shoehorning" players into an XI to fit them in, which begs the question, do we decide on a formation and then fit the players in or do we decide who our best few players are and fit the formation to that?

Ole clearly prefers the 4-2-3-1 yet we have Pogba who I think fits best as a Mezzala or left of a diamond, so we shoehorn him in a #6 position.

The other method suggests that our best/ most stocked area is the non defensive midfielders, now Pogba, Fernandes & VDB, surely a diamond would fit them better with Matic at the base.

Question is then, do you fit the formation around your players or fit your players into the formation?

Pogba can play in a 2, didn’t he win the World Cup playing that position? He isn’t restricted to staying deep either and is allowed forward runs.

Pogba looked rusty but will get much better throughout the season.

Other than that I don’t know who else is being shoehorned? Greenwood maybe? Who has been productive on the wing.

literally we went 20+ games unbeaten, so I don’t think it was the formation, rather than rustiness that we lost and poor play from individuals.

 

[Web of Bissaka]

Question is then, do you fit the formation around your players or fit your players into the formation?

Bit of both. Nice balance of both.

At the moment, it's not a good balance since it's relying heavily on a top form Bruno. No purple patch Bruno, no party. Pogba at #6 could still work even if it's not bringing out the best out of him. The team matters more, not the formation nor players, each still matters of course if you want a stronger team. France with Pogba there works because similarly, other players mainly Mbappe step-up. It's not a system that seek to brought out the best of Pogba, that's for sure.

Manager's job is to get a good balance between formation and players, and no, we're not doing good at the moment. It's too limiting and conditional which we can already see late last season... no wonder why we're still stubborn about this or just don't want to see the flaws.

 

[Bebestation]

The 433 is the most fluid formation because it allows you to rebalance and play up to a 235 in possession and a 532 in defense. Our Rivals always play with a 235 and the players positioning adds the ability to play the tactic they choose ie possession or pressing.

In my opinion we dont lack creativity in our first team (we need more in the squad) but the players are all over the place - playing too deep (pogba), playing too further forward(bruno & even Martial), playing too wide and deep behind the forward instead of being the inverted forward(Rashford & Greenwood). I'm okay with our fullbacks being defensive minded but their area is constantly blocked by players in their way ( we saw this with Wan Bissaka not being able to get past James hugging the touchline but instantly made runs and atleast made space by making runs once Greenwood came and played more inverted; Rashford is now playing too wide as a creative forward rather than someone who should be playing closer and further forward near Martial like Aubemayang does with Lacazette).

The formation is a poor choice.

 

[He'sRaldo]

If the formation works then we wouldn't have to ask the question, as it would enhance the players.

 

[jeff_goldblum]

Pogba can play in a 2, didn’t he win the World Cup playing that position? He isn’t restricted to staying deep either and is allowed forward runs.

No, it was a lopsided 4-3-3. Kanté and Matuidi were behind/alongside Pogba in the middle, Griezemann played centrally behind Giroud, allowing Pogba to gravitate to that advanced left-ish position he likes when attacking.

 

[Valencia Shin Crosses]

I don't really care about the named or drawn out formation as much as I do the positioning of our players within the game. Pogba is very effective as a 6 against teams that sit back and defend deep. Give him time on the ball and he'll shred you with passes. However, he really struggles against high presses when he is the player that has to connect play from our CB's to the attackers, because it requires releasing the ball quickly in between pressing players, which is something he doesn't do often.

The main issues with how we currently line up at the moment are the overload of the left side that occurs without quality on the right, and the lack of attacking threat from fullbacks while playing with inside forwards. Pogba is fine as a 6; he'll be up and down and will make a few mistakes but also do things no other players can as long as he has a quality cover man that is positionally astute beside him. However, in attack Bruno, Rashford, and Martial all drift towards that left side of the pitch, which makes overloading that side with defenders an easy tactic against us because no one is going to be afraid of AWB or TFM punishing the opposite wing. Greenwood helps some because if he gets space with the ball he can score from anywhere, but he isn't a player that is going to consistently beat an isolated fullback who is there for the taking.

So basically teams just have to press high up the pitch, overload the left side of our attack with bodies, and dare the right side to beat them. More likely than not this won't happen if we aren't at full strength, and we become toothless in attack unless one of our stars pulls off a piece of individual skill to beat a team. The way forward is to get another fullback who isn't a liability in possession and offers a threat down the right side, a CB who is press resistant, and a RW that is excellent at beating fullbacks in space. I'm not going to go into who we can buy that offers these things as that has been discussed ad nauseam, but with even two out of those three players I think we'd see a transformed United team that isn't so inconsistent against pesky teams.

 

[MadDogg]

The other method suggests that our best/ most stocked area is the non defensive midfielders, now Pogba, Fernandes & VDB, surely a diamond would fit them better with Matic at the base.

A diamond might work well for our midfielders but it requires attacking fullbacks to provide the width. Something we certainly don't have.

 

[He'sRaldo]

A diamond might work well for our midfielders but it requires attacking fullbacks to provide the width. Something we certainly don't have.

So in that case the question would be, do we make the better players adapt to enhance the worse ones, or vice versa?

Or alternatively, find something that makes them shine in their respective roles.

 

[Lee565]

Unfortunately we will struggle to play with a narrow formation because of our full backs even if telles comes in because bissaka is not good enough on the ball, but could we try playing bruno as a false number 9 with rashford/Greenwood on the right and martial/rashford on the left and a midfield 3 of beek, matic and pogba?

I also think we really do need 3 in midfield if we are going to use pogba and matic in it because a midfield 2 of them 2 just leaves a slow and immobile matic too much to do and will get completely over run in midfield and when we have such a slow and immobile central defense it makes the situation even worse.

 

[buckooo1978]

for me its players mainly

Solskjaer has shown some decent tactical acumen at times, particularly from February and either side of lockdown

We dont have the players in place I think to effectively play the 4-2-3-1 or 4-3-3 system he favours for a few reasons - our main weakness is wide positions and Palace showed that if you are compact and organised then Rashford, Greenwood,James, Mata, Shaw, Williams, AWB, Fosu Mensah don't have the creativity to hurt teams

1. Wide attackers - Rashford is patchy at best and his form since his injury has been really poor. Mata not quick enough, Lingard poor and James looks out of his depth. Dont feel that Rashford and Greenwood are natural wide attacking players and it feels like they are doing a job there.

2. Full backs - again a real weakness. We don't have a natural footballer in our full back positions which we are all aware of.

3. Balance in Midfield and the Pogba question. Im a big Pogba fan but in a double pivot I don't think he's effective as a Carrick and certainly a Scholes. Great player but feel like we've shoehorned him in there. Matic is decent when not pressured but he's not got the mobility or passing range youd want. Thiago would have fitted perfectly i felt.

Its no surprise that we are after a LB and RW or reported to be anyway

 

[Silas]

I just find it weird that Ole changed to a 4231 when the 433 we played during his interim period was what got him the job in the first place. Pogba was sensational as the most advanced of the three and we clearly had a good thing going. Not saying that we can't achieve anything with a 4231, but quite clearly there's an issue with the midfield positioning.

 

[Bwuk]

We don’t suit 4231.

 

[Garethw]

Ole needs to sort his tactics out otherwise he’s going to be unemployed by Christmas.

 

[kidbob]

Just watching us against Luton and there is no width whatsoever. Every time AWB or Williams do get the ball they are left out there on their own so it's either dribble past two players or pass it back while all our forward and midfield players stand central. We had a run of games where Shaw and Rashford worked well together at creating overlaps but that seems to have been abandoned despite the fact it was creating opportunities.

Other than that when our centre backs have the ball they refuse to move forward with it and instead pass it into midfield for it just to be passed right back to them. All they really need to do is bring the ball forward and have the midfield push up at the same time and we'd be starting attacks from 20 yards further up the field.

There is also a real lack of urgency in everything we do with and without the ball even in our desire to win the ball back. Honestly it's like we are levels below other teams in fitness levels.

I don't think any of that has to do with formations to be honest unless it's instructions being given. I also find it hard to believe that our players are actually that unfit either. I think it's a cohesion thing. We don't do things as a team enough. Every so often we have bursts of it in game but we just seem to move as individuals in attack defence and transitions. I think teams like City and Liverpool actually look like their putting more effort in than they are because they save energy by doing everything as a unit. We'll have the defence and midfield deep with the forwards really high up and silly things like that, we'll leave players isolated with no options which slows down our play. I don't think a formation change fixes that or even new players, it's simply drilling the team endlessly until they learn to be able to do all parts of the game as a unit.

 

[clarkydaz]

I just find it weird that Ole changed to a 4231 when the 433 we played during his interim period was what got him the job in the first place. Pogba was sensational as the most advanced of the three and we clearly had a good thing going. Not saying that we can't achieve anything with a 4231, but quite clearly there's an issue with the midfield positioning.

Agreed this is hugely annoying. I thought it was a short term abandonment due to herrera getting injured, but he never went back to how we looked best

 

[Clermontois]

Bit of both. Nice balance of both.

At the moment, it's not a good balance since it's relying heavily on a top form Bruno. No purple patch Bruno, no party. Pogba at #6 could still work even if it's not bringing out the best out of him. The team matters more, not the formation nor players, each still matters of course if you want a stronger team. France with Pogba there works because similarly, other players mainly Mbappe step-up. It's not a system that seek to brought out the best of Pogba, that's for sure.

Manager's job is to get a good balance between formation and players, and no, we're not doing good at the moment. It's too limiting and conditional which we can already see late last season... no wonder why we're still stubborn about this or just don't want to see the flaws.

Those two statements conflict with each other.