Just join Sincher and slit your wrists
"Negative Tactics" in Europe
- Thread starter Pogue Mahone
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik (@Rood) was joined by comedian Ali Woods to look back at the best and worst moments of a rollercoaster season with the annual United Hour Awards.
Has Ten Hag been sacked yet? We're not sure and we hope not, but it's looking more likely as the days pass.
Who should replace him and why is it taking so long to make a decision?
When you play 451 both opposition fullbacks can attack more freely, there are more players to mark which spreads the defence further which leaves as much room for wonder goals
That's true, to a point. We certainly seem to concede possession a lot more readily in that formation. Especially when we play poorly (as we did last night)
But the crucial difference, IMO, is that the opposition struggle to convert that possession into chances on goal. For all that we played badly last night, VdS has an unusually quiet evening. I don't think many teams could have restricted Lyon to so few decent opportuntites (two? three?) over two legs of football. So we must have done something right, defensively.
Plus the opposition has the ball the whole time
I agree, we are however more likely to create chances and score goals, wonder or otherwise.
That's rubbish
Thats the biggest one
Again, rubbish.
Comes down to the tectics and personnel used, not the formation.
You would never understand this though.
A back 4 against 442 will leave 3 men back, a back 4 against 451 will leave 2 men back, one back for each man and one spare
I am 99.9% sure that you never watch football.
No teams leave 2 back against us, whether we play 442, 451, 433, 118 or 811.
For us 442 works better, you'd only have to have watched us for the last 5 years to see how much more comfortable and threatening we are when we switch mid game from 451 to a 442, it happens so often its silly
Yet, we have the majority of possession in majority of our games
I can't, because I don't see us play 442 or 451 or whatever for large parts of the games.
It's black or white for you.
Lyon did leave 2 back on occasion yesterday, Milan did as well, their only width comes from fullbacks and both got up in the same attack.
Lyon left two at the back when they got desperate in the last 10 mins.
When Milan have both fullbacks racing forward, at least one of the midfielders stays.
No, they had their fullbacks moving up a lot earlier then that
Thats far from the same as keeping a fullback in defence
I agree. If they were in the premierleague they would be fighting the league with us, Chelsea and Arsenal.
Even with Hargreaves we still dont have the personnel to always play cautious in CL ties. We are simply to used to playing run and gun in the League. Yes our record this year in tight contests is good but we simply arent the same team with Rooney up front. He is too versatile to being up on his own. I dont get why everyone thinks that having one player up front 'neutralizes' the other team. I think United can play great defensively even with 2 players up front. Think about it - our defending is fecking amazing and playing 2 up front may cost us a goal but Rooney,Saha,and Ronaldo attacking is good for more than a goal at home or away. As long as everyone (except Ronny, he simply doesnt track back enough) tracks back and plays smart, we should play 2 up front and still be tight at the back.
No. It's you who keeps claiming it was 4-4-2.
Lets just agree that we play a 4-6 and have some cake.
Of course that is true if you're talking the last 5 years. Simply because we never had the players to play 4-2-3-1 properly until last season. Actually, I should stress that most of the times we have played poorly it was because it was a 4-5-1 with three central midfielders.
Now that we have Carrick and Anderson, we have the players capable of playing 4-2-3-1. And using that formation we've destroyed Roma (although Giggs played that game rather than Anderson), Arsenal and Newcastle, and completely dominated Lyon (and only wasteful finishing stopped that from being a much bigger scoreline).
The key difference is obvious, and I find it ridiculous when people lump both under the same 4-5-1 banner. 4-5-1 has three central midfielders playing in the middle of the park, with two wingers and a striker who invariably gets left alone. Whereas a 4-2-3-1 has two central midfielders staying deep, two wingers and another player (either an attacking midfielder who can run at people and create for others like Anderson or Giggs, or a deep lying forward) all buzzing around behind the main striker. Basically there is one extra player attacking. But strangely so many people say that if that player is nominally a midfielder it's a 4-5-1, but if a forward plays that exact same position they call it a 4-4-2. In reality, 4-2-3-1 when used well has the best things from both formations. The midfield control of 4-5-1, and the attacking verve of 4-4-2.
Basically, we did to Lyon what Milan did to us last season. Complete domination, harrying them off the ball the instant they got it and not letting them build anything. We didn't use the ball as well as Milan did, but that was mostly because Anderson had a bit of an off-day. But we still dominated them, and if the final ball had worked for us we could easily have scored 4.
Correct
The problem with 4 5 1 or 4 2 3 1 is that we set out to play with a solitary striker - Rooney. Although he will battle away manfully in any situation he really isn't suited to the role. It's important that he plays with or off someone else and that is most likely to be Tevez or perhaps Saha. There is no evidence to suggest that the Tevez / Rooney partnership isn't our most potent attacking option and yet we don't seem to start with it that often. The three man central midfield has proved to be the way to go but we need to avoid the solitary striker option. 4 2 1 3 is our best option with Carrick and Hargreaves (Fletcher) holding the midfield and Scholes (Anderson) prompting a front three of Rooney, Tevez and Ronaldo.
It's only during the latter stages of CL, when only the quality teams remain that 442 becomes a bigger risk, relatively. I think Fergie probably deduce his lack of success in the latter CL stages to this fact and that unless we become more tactically astute - 1999 will never repeat. I'm curious to know how recent CL winners lined up.
based on Uefa.com -
2006/07: AC Milan (4411)
2005/06: Barcelona (433)
2004/05: Liverpool (41311)
2003/04: Porto (4312)
2002/03: AC Milan (4312)
2001/02: Real Madrid (41212)
2000/01: Bayern Munich (?)
1999/00: Real Madrid (?)
1998/99: Manchester United (442)
From memory it was only the Spanish winners in that list that ever played what we would consider to be attacking football. The rest were either very conservative, or somewhere in between (discounting United in 99 of course)
However, Barcelona have had the quality to win it more times than they have in the last few years. Its most likely their naive tactical approach that prevented them from doing so, and they always struggled against teams that knew how to defend.
Madrid, well they had probably five or six of the top ten players in the world over that period. They were an attacking, flamboyant side but had an embarrassment of riches that has been unequalled since then.
The point is that the evidence isn't conclusive either way. You can win it playing expansive football, you can win it conservatively. Any given year your chances of winning it either way aren't great, unless you're AC Milan.
Italian sides will probably have more luck playing cagey football, cos they're good at it. So are Chelsea and Liverpool. We're generally not, though we've been quite effective so far this season.
If it doesn't work this season, will it be time to scrap the experiment? Will it ever? Or will we have to carry on watching a wonderful, exciting side playing largely boring football, because of the myth that that's always and eternally a better way to win the CL?
Italian sides will probably have more luck playing cagey football, cos they're good at it. So are Chelsea and Liverpool. We're generally not, though we've been quite effective so far this season.
If it doesn't work this season, will it be time to scrap the experiment? Will it ever? Or will we have to carry on watching a wonderful, exciting side playing largely boring football, because of the myth that that's always and eternally a better way to win the CL?
We don't play 4-5-1 we actually play 4-6-0 (as Rooney drops in as well!) at Home that is just bloody stupid, we could have hammered Lyon at OT had we played our normal tactics, as it turned out it didn't matter but it seems to me that SAF rests players in the PL and plays negative tactics in the CL.
Our club has been built on playing attacking football and to see us at Home against a French team playing with nobody upfront is very frustrating.
Our club has been built on playing attacking football and to see us at Home against a French team playing with nobody upfront is very frustrating.
A few corrections
I think we did the right thing at home to lyon setting up the way we did. After the first leg at 1-1, at kick off we were going through on away goals, we had nothing to chase it was up to them to come at us so we could pick them off, fairly logical stuff. It transpired that they too were very cautious about opening up for the threat of our counter so the tie was very delicate, I don't think we knew at times whether to attack or defend, stay or go, and because of that the game was very messy and had no shape to it. It resulted in a very nervous performance from us in the 2nd half, which was frustrating because as lyon came at us more we should have been picking them off then but by that stage we were terrible in posession and Rooney wasted several good positions to kill the tie. I think given the delicate balance of the tie the tactics and formation were right but the performance certainly wasn't, we lacked composure and got nervous which prevented us from knowing when to commit men forward effectively and sensibly to kill the game off, we are through anyway but hopefully we learn from it.
Indeed there was nothing wrong with the tactics against Lyon and there was not much wrong with the football either. I thought we were very positive and pushed forward the whole time. We could have won by a wider margin. However, Carrick and Fletcher particularly, ensured they weren't going to dominate the midfield and get a goal or two which could have been disastrous. It is wrong to think that a 4 3 3 type formation is negative - it is not - particularly with the talent we have. It just means that we have a far more solid look to our midfield which opposition teams will find difficult to dominate.
I think we'd have to have another three or four seasons without winning it before Ferguson changes his approach. He is obviously dead-set that this is our best chance, and so is Queiroz.
When it comes to the CL, I don't believe that its a myth that this is the best way to win. We just beat a decent Lyon side fairly comfortably without playing well in either leg. If we'd had just one good performance out of the two, we'd have been out of sight.
Time will tell though. Results are everything.
This team should be played in europe, with Scholes to play most of the home games in place of Hargreaves, and Giggs as replacement for Anderson, or Tevez
---------------Carrick---------------
------Hargreaves----Anderson-------
Ronaldo-------------Tevez----------
-------------Rooney----------------
---------------Carrick---------------
------Hargreaves----Anderson-------
Ronaldo-------------Tevez----------
-------------Rooney----------------
Anderson still has a long way to go before he is fit to lace Scholes's boots.
But Fletcher is currently playing better than Hargreaves.
he gives us the legs that Scholesy doesn't
On the evidence of the Fulham game, Scholes can still play a more attacking role in midfield which is his most effective position. On the evidence of the Lyon game, Anderson was very possibly less effective than Scholes would have been in that position. PS still has the edge which is understandable given Anderson's age and comparative lack of experience.
Fletcher demonstrated that he has the ability to play the Hargreaves role to good effect.
Fletcher demonstrated that he has the ability to play the Hargreaves role to good effect.
true, but Hargreaves will play more games, due to being bought only recently for a lot of money. Hargreaves has better speed about him as well, and with Carrick in behind, his faults in positioning would be made up for.
Fletchers a good player, but Hargreaves is better imo.
I would say Hargreaves is the better defensive midfielder because of his ability to tackle and his speed. However, Fletcher brings a far better passing ability and if he is able to show he can tackle and cover well, which he did against Lyon, then maybe there's not much to choose between them.
no there's not much, though as you've said Hargreaves has real pace. That can't be underestimated really, it'll be needed again and again in Europe.
Thats not necessarily true, and paints a picture that Scholes loiters around the centre circle or something. What Scholes has lost from his game is the knack of getting beyond the strikers, or being around the penalty spot when a cross comes in. Anderson doesn't give us that either. Not yet.
Scholes is the best passer of the ball at United. When he is playing well, United play very well. Everything goes through him and he is the hub of the team. Anderson doesn't give us that. Not yet.
Then again, I'm one of the minority on here who think Anderson isn't the second coming of Christ. Not yet, anyway. He has frightening potential, but Scholes is still a much better player.