greydos

Aye that Ajax team have been garbage over the years like. Oh f*** wait, Johan Cruijff says f*** you. The examples you give are always the exception to the domination of 442. How many international tournaments, champions league tournaments, premierships have been won by 433? About 6? How many have been won by 442? about 1,069,991 and counting. Funny thing is, if someone tried telling Johan Cruijff his team were successful because of the formation and that in a different formation the personnel wouldn't have been as successful, he'd probably tell you to f*** yourself, an rightly so! Is this a wind-up? The last three Premierships have been won with 4-3-3. The current leaders play 4-5-1. No wind-up. I said history. Football has been played for some 120 years. 433 has been prominent at most in the last 25 years. 3 premiership titles is nothing against a backdrop of 90+ years of non-existence and non-success What a ridiculous comment. Wasn't 4-2-4 the formation of choice before 4-4-2? And what about 2-3-5, is that the classic football formation? The point it, which one's going to work now, not which one worked best in the past. What is so ridiculous? I was responding to comments earlier on in this thread along the lines of '433 is the greatest formation ever no one's said that, it's so brilliant blah blah blah'. I am merely pointing out that before i would label a formation the best 'ever', i would wait till it has some substantial success behind it. I am not saying 442 is the best formation ever and you're clearly saying that, but it's had more success in the history of the game than 433 so? three premier league's on the trot won with 4-3-3, and so has a much better shout of being labelled the best formation ever. 433 is kak. that was my intial point, and i stand by it. for all those people that because they can remember 1 successful football team that got success with a formation that is not 442, please don't feel you have to throw that at me as some riposte to my overall point. YG, i'm not quite sure what you've tried to do there, but if the emboldened text is supposed to say that nobody in this thread has said that 433 is the best ever formation (i'm guessing that's what you mean?) then i would point to HTT's post at the top of page 3: '4-3-3 is the ultimate and most flexible formation ever concepted in football and will be a huge success for us, once we have the players for it...' I know it's slightly tongue in cheek the way he has worded it, but the sentiment behind it i have heard him say before (in particular in mammoth posts about how it's the best for 'transitional play' and how mourinho goes to bed with 433 written all over his favourite pyjamas etc etc. The point i was making is that if any formation is going to have a chance of being labelled 'the ultimate', 'the best', or whatever else anyone wants to call it, then it's got to have a history of success much greater than 442, which has dominated football at every level for more years than most of the other formations.

Aye that Ajax team have been garbage over the years like. Oh f*** wait, Johan Cruijff says f*** you. The examples you give are always the exception to the domination of 442. How many international tournaments, champions league tournaments, premierships have been won by 433? About 6? How many have been won by 442? about 1,069,991 and counting. Funny thing is, if someone tried telling Johan Cruijff his team were successful because of the formation and that in a different formation the personnel wouldn't have been as successful, he'd probably tell you to f*** yourself, an rightly so! Is this a wind-up? The last three Premierships have been won with 4-3-3. The current leaders play 4-5-1. No wind-up. I said history. Football has been played for some 120 years. 433 has been prominent at most in the last 25 years. 3 premiership titles is nothing against a backdrop of 90+ years of non-existence and non-success What a ridiculous comment. Wasn't 4-2-4 the formation of choice before 4-4-2? And what about 2-3-5, is that the classic football formation? The point it, which one's going to work now, not which one worked best in the past. What is so ridiculous? I was responding to comments earlier on in this thread along the lines of '433 is the greatest formation ever, it's so brilliant blah blah blah'. I am merely pointing out that before i would label a formation the best 'ever', i would wait till it has some substantial success behind it. I am not saying 442 is the best formation ever, but it's had more success in the history of the game than 433, and so has a much better shout of being labelled the best formation ever. 433 is kak. that was my intial point, and i stand by it. for all those people that because they can remember 1 successful football team that got success with a formation that is not 442, please don't feel you have to throw that at me as some riposte to my overall point.

Aye that Ajax team have been garbage over the years like. Oh f*** wait, Johan Cruijff says f*** you. The examples you give are always the exception to the domination of 442. How many international tournaments, champions league tournaments, premierships have been won by 433? About 6? How many have been won by 442? about 1,069,991 and counting. Funny thing is, if someone tried telling Johan Cruijff his team were successful because of the formation and that in a different formation the personnel wouldn't have been as successful, he'd probably tell you to f*** yourself, an rightly so! Is this a wind-up? The last three Premierships have been won with 4-3-3. The current leaders play 4-5-1. No wind-up. I said history. Football has been played for some 120 years. 433 has been prominent at most in the last 25 years. 3 premiership titles is nothing against a backdrop of 90+ years of non-existence and non-success

Aye that Ajax team have been garbage over the years like. Oh f*** wait, Johan Cruijff says f*** you. The examples you give are always the exception to the domination of 442. How many international tournaments, champions league tournaments, premierships have been won by 433? About 6? How many have been won by 442? about 1,069,991 and counting. Funny thing is, if someone tried telling Johan Cruijff his team were successful because of the formation and that in a different formation the personnel wouldn't have been as successful, he'd probably tell you to f*** yourself, an rightly so!

433 (aka 451 in stealth mode) is kak! Crap formation, kak ideology behind it, and has no history of success in the game of football, and probably never will have!

------------Given Beye--Taylor--Cacapa--Enrique -------------Faye------------- ---Barton--------Emre----- Milner---------------------Zog ------------Viduka Faye should be first choice DM when fit. More athleticism than butt, passing is slightly better (although not hard) and is a beast in the air, giving us the benefit of playing cacapa (great experience) and Taylor (young, passionate and developing) as well as taking out Nicky Butt (reason enough on its own surely?). Faye at DM also gives emre and barton licence to get passed Viduka, as one of the midfield 3 should be doing, ala cahill and osman at everton, or fabregash at arse, or dyer at west ham hahahahahhaha

---------------Given--------------------- Beye--Taylor--Cacapa--Enrique ---------------Faye--------------------- -------Barton---------Emre Martins--------------------N'Zog ---------------Smith Bench: Harper, Roz, Geremi, Milner, Vids

This This This

The best way to scare an opposition wide player is to put a better wide player on our team out wide, who's going to give the full back such a torrid time their manager is going to be screaming at their wide player to track back and help. having a poor attacking cm out wide says to the opposition full back, mate you're going to have an easy day, you don't have to worry about what's behind you as emre/bowyer/smith/barton's not going to come passed you either with or without the ball, so knock yourself out, why don't you try a few forays forward. what's to stop you?

The first post is waaaaaaaaaaaay too long!! I read it thoroughly and my response in summary is that most of the points stated in it apply to any formation, particularly 442. For instance, the "he's training zoggy at left back so he can defend as a wide forward" argument applies equally to wingers in a 442. The wide players in any formation have to track back, that's the nature of football. Also, because mourinho plays it doesn't make it the best formation, as in history you'll find more things have been won with 442 than any other formation. "Transitional Play" is another baffling concept as the 1994 and 1999 Man U teams were the best at counter-attacking when they had to, quality centre midfield passing spraying the ball to Giggs, Kanchelskis et al an rapidly turning defence to attack. Same with us under SBR, the pace of dyer, robert and bellamy allied to solano's craft often seen us tear up the other end of the field and score goals. Being able to counter-attack a team does not depend on systems, but personnel. Pace and ability to trap the ball at high speed and execute final ball passing is the key to effective counter-attacking in my eyes.

Given Beye Faye Rozehnal Enrique Martins Emre Butt Zog Owen Smith 4-1

Point amongst points!! It's like my old champ man days when i would manage a second team to buy all my crap off me for extraordinary prices to make myself rich!! Throw in Peter Ramge whilst we're at it!

We're out mate

I notice you tried to convince me there HTT that Quinton Fortune is an example of SA wanting attractive technically gifted footballers? (There were other examples you said which made me laugh equally as much!!) Also, SA didn't sign "2 attacking fullbacks". He signed Beye, a centre back who has been converted for a couple of years into a full back, for whom getting forward is NOT a strength, but being defensively solid, quick and athletic is. And he bought Enrique, not an attacking fullback, but nicknamed "the Bull" for his hard tackling. Also, about Cacapa and Rozenhal, SA did not say that they were good because they were good passing defenders, he only recently said that Cacapa's ability to pass is incidental to his qualities, and that he's a "destroyer" not a player. SA is all about being workmanlike, efficient, and effective. He analyses what seems to work best on paper, i.e. statistics about how teams concede goals, usually through not being able to concentrate for a full 90 minutes when faced with having to clear their lines from aerial bombardments, and sets about making that happen on the pitch. Hence EVERY throw in we ever get we'll have to witness Geremi try and launch it into their box. There's no excuses for that, it evinces SA' intentions perfectly

HTT nobody wants this team to be the finished article after 6 games. What we want is there to be signs that we want to play positive football. If you've got a whole pre-season with a team, there is no doubt in my mind that Sam could have coached them to at least attempt passing triangles and movement in matches. Even if we played possession football for 20 mins in a match, that would show where he wants to go. Right now, there is no evidence that he even wants to play nice football as his long term aim. Oh, and for the record, there was not an Okocha for every grafter at Bolton. There was ONE Okocha, and ONE Anelka. There were PLENTY of grafters

Firstly, Tino Asprilla a wide man? Secondly, i thought it was a Blackburn article not a newcaslte one!!

For me it's Owen Ameobi Martins. Lob the ball up to ameobi and his first touch will reliably go anywhere, leading to many 'accidental' assists for owen or martins i think.

1. newcastle 18. chelsea (that way they have season long hopes of survival before dropping) 19. west ham 20. spurs

Which is why he's the BEST. EVER. Again NM, there's a "by far" missing

there's a "by far" missing from the title of this thread

i thought this was going to be a "yes" and move on thread

Milner's good enough for newcastle now, yes. Until we have two right wingers better than him, he'll be good enough in my eyes. And, when thinking about two better wingers, allow for the fact that milner will get better, and will probably end his career playing in a box to box midfield role

Fair enough points HTT. I wasn't aware of this 'database', would be very interested to know where you got this from? (is this some kind of subtle FM 2006 joke?) Not sure i read Enrique's quotes about BS being after him for a while, i know rozenhal said that, but fair enough if he did say. Ultimately, the Enrique situation is a matter of time and coaching. My two biggest concerns are really that ideally, Big Sam's vision of how to win a football match would be all about being strong and percentage football, relying on the human errors of the oppositions, as opposed to wanting to rip the opposition open and gut them, ala Ferguson, Wenger Keegan. Still, many many positives. Chuffed with keeping N'Zogbia, and the defence is marvellous. The fact that he's brought in specialists to the club has been good, and also, he brings an added discipline and noticeable team spirit, without making that what he's all about (al Souness). I think the most pleasing aspect of Allardyce for me is, his desire to get controversial players in and manage them. Souness with Robert and Bellamy just shirked the challenge, couldn't hack a bit of attitude for the sake of the team. Roeder would freeze people out. Big Sam relished having Barton here for what he gave the team, and backed himself to overcome problems that players can present. It's that self-belief, epitomised in the manager, which if it gets through to the team, i think will really take us far

Please don't shoot me down as a pessimist, as i'm not, but i want to inject a different perspective and some other thoughts on what's happened at the club this summer. Sam's transfers in have been very good, can't fault who has has brought in, bar smith. Unecessary signing, and seemed as though it was the type of reactionary purchase that all in this thread are saying he doesn't got for,( i.e he plans all his signings meticulously etc). This doesn't seem the case as he said something along the lines of "as soon as i heard he was going i said snap him up"). I think that tells us he didn't actually plan for alan smith, at least not on trying to lure him here. and i can't see where smith fits in. Similarly, the Enrique transfer, allardyce said something like "the chairman rang me up and said, we can get enrique, do you want him for Xmillion?". That to me is ambiguous as to whether he was planned for and targeted or not, especially as many rumours had us after dragutinovic. In terms of tactics and playing style, i'm a bit concerned. We're turning into a team that are very strong, solid, and will fight for every last ball. We will rarely, if ever, experience a 5-0 defeat against birmingham at home under Allardyce. And that's a positive. But i just wonder, given all the money in the world, what Big Sam's IDEAL style of play would be. Would he still want balls in the box targetting mistakes of other defenders, or prefer a better more exciting style which relies not on mistakes of the opposition, but the brilliance of us being able to open them up with our attacks. The final point i would make is that, Big Sam has said some things that i just don't like to hear, now matter how true it is, and i wouldn't want him to say those things internally in the club, to players/staff etc. Such as "heinze would probably want to go to a bigger club than us". i would much prefer him to say, "if heinze wants a challenege at another genuine big club, there could be an opportunity for him here" etc. Basically, backing ourselves. There was one thing that i did agree with Glenn Roeder saying, and that is, we should not be overawed by the big teams and think they're different and better than us, we should have a more positive strong attitude. We're newcastle, we're a big club, a good team. Back yourselves to be better than others.

Can anyone give a tactical/detailed opinion for why Cacapa impressed on the weekend? I didn't get to see the game as what at an all day Hindu wedding