The College Dropout

On a 4-4-2. "If you do that, you only have one point of attack," he said. "Whereas if you have one guy dropping off, you have two points of attack." Old fergie.

This season they have not settled on a system. They played 2 up front on properly on the weekend granted but they deployed a 4-4-1-1 a lot last season.

How many teams play with 2 out and out strikers? Us and fucking QPR.

Didn't have a direct opponent on the weekend but he was okay. I don't understand why Pardew insists on him playing conservatively at the beginning of games. Get Santon forward and push the opposition wide players back. That's his strengths. He's a decent defender but if he's told to be defensive we might as well play Simpson.

Struggling sides. Norwich get outclassed as do reading so that's probably not fair. Stoke go long & QPR have been terrible. Agreed. Cabs & Tiote are good players but they will struggle against 3 other players. Even Redknapp knew you need a proper link man at the very least to compete in midfield.

We launch the ball from Harper, they win it in the aerial duel with the strikers and they go from their. Possession was 80-20 in the first 20. They got the ball and just ran rings around us. Our wide players out of the game. You have to compete in the middle of the pitch by all means.

How many other teams in the league play 4-4-2?

He & YoCabs where up against 4 Man Utd. central midfield players. Chasing shadows in that opening spell, I don't think either of them recovered mentally. At times on this board we don't consider the other teams players when judging a performance. Our central players were outnumbered 2 to 4!

His distribution is fast with the ball in his hands, looks to get it to the midfielders quickly. That's great. Everything else..... yeah.....

Needs to either play on the right or in the middle.

Well it now seems to be a mainstream opinion that there is some kind of problem in the Ba-Cisse partnership. The debate is about whether it's solveable. I just wonder if we've got a similar situation to Drogba at Chelsea. He was a strong character who was very difficult to leave out on ability as well, but now he's gone, Torres and the whole of the team look a lot better. Bad example. If Drogba was 27 they wouldn't have Fernando Tores. Furthermore, the previous team was built for Drogba and this team Torres.If a manager got the most out of Drogba, Chelsea won trophies.

His game is very physical. It's not surprise he picks up a lot of niggles.

Fullbacks can be very small. Cole, Carlos etc. wee lads.

With young players you have to bite the bullet. Not against Manchester United but he should look to start his LB career from here on. Attacking FB's have to learn the defensive part on the job, Cole once upon a time looked shaky defensively. You need to trust the young ones you really think can make it.

Had no choice. Timothy is better.

Last season they played a very deep, narrow system based on counter-attacks. A literal 4-5-1 at times. First we must say Chelsea weren't great last season, they finished 6th. They won 2 cups that all involved what I described above in the semi's & final which isn't possible to do if you want to win league titles. Playing so deep your midfielders don't have to do as much running. He had so much protection in a lot of their key games. They always played Ramires, Meireles, Kalou, very tactically aware players with excellent engines. Ramires in particular, who in a counter-attacking system can play a dual role as CM and RW/AM. He scored/assisted in many of their crucial cup games with Lampard sitting and spraying balls which he would inexplicably run onto to score and create. They also had Drogba who they could knock the ball long too, he could hold it up from there for Mata/Meireles/Ramires to arrive, they do not have that option this season. Now they play a little further up the pitch and there's more space involved as their attacking players need to be closer to Torres. Against Athletico & Juve he & Mikel were exposed and they showed they cannot cope with good teams with a lot of energy in the middle. They simply lack the mobility. Di Matteo has cottoned on and brought Ramires alongside Arsenal and it worked a treat. Nobody is going to give Ramires the runaround. Like I said before, he has the engine of 2 players and it makes the system much more effective against better teams. So in short, yes his legs had gone last year too but they played a system based on his strengths (long range key passes, determination/hard work, strength) and hiding his weaknesses (running in wide spaces, lack of mobility). Now they play a more expansive game and he & Mikel together, are too detached and different in style of play to their front players and Lampard is looking old/slow as a result.

Yes, we look good whenever Shola comes on. It helps that defenders are tired but AC has that effect all game often. Knock it long, he lays it off to one of our better players and we go from there. Most of our goals come from 2-3 passing moves. We rarely end up with a 4-5 pass goal.

It's very clear Lampard's legs have gone now.

In essence Manchester United & Arsenal have played the same way for 15 years. Formations & tactics change, styles of play generally remain the same. Everton & Stoke both play 4-5-1, the way they play it is totally different. Arsenal now play 4-1-2-3 but in essence, the same philosophy applies to their invincibles in a 4-4-2.

There's hope I would say. After a decade in charge, I think Moyes has imposed Everton's game onto other teams whereas he's often the other way around. They rigth now have a style similar to the most vintage Man Utd. side although with inferior players. A lot of pace and power throughout the side but a focus on getting it down to play.

Fully agree with every point. Some on here want us to play possession football but that's not where the success was found with the 4-2-1-3/4-3-3.

True but I see tons of posts/threads about formations and line-ups. I wanted a discussion purely about our general style of play.

Arsenal have changed formation a lot during the last few years. Manchester United too but at the core the style of play has remained the same. Arsenal are about controlling games with short passing and decisive through balls. Manchester United still try to play rapid football. For us, even when we change formations we are still primarily a long ball team. No pattern of cohesive play. That's our biggest problem. We must not work at our attacking play in training very much because it seems sporadic. Pardew has no sense of attacking philosophy. Going forward we hope Cabaye/HBA can produce something for Cisse/Ba, with Tiote & Jonas chipping in. Santon goes forward cuts inside all the time but there's no plan of what to do when he does it. Jonas going forward seems to be an afterthought. This is probably the single worst thing about our team and Pardew as a manager.

If we are going with both strikers, one needs to drop deep at times and that will most likely be Ba as his approach play is better than Cisse's. Ferguson needs to play in some capacity. Whether at LB or LM. He provides genuine width and crossing ability.

Not really. That fullback from Charlton was largely derided as terrible last season. Aaron Ramsey too. Wenger really gives his youngsters a chance. Sometimes it doesn't work (see: Denilson) but the record is there for itself.