4-5-1 Or 4-4-2? When At Home

[internetjef]

we seemed to change from 4-4-2 to an attacking 4-5-1 at half time with trundle pushed out onto the right and williiams tucked in.

a lot of the guys around me in dolman were dissapointed at what was perceived a negative move (only one striker left up front)

However we created much more with the five man midfield and certainly played much better. so is it better at home to play the negatively perceived 4-5-1 and play well, or go with an aggressive 4-4-2 but create little??

i reckon that maybe the 4-5-1 is the better call? only problem is now for the first time in ages we have loads of strikers to pick from. bit of a headscratcher eh? what does everryone else think we should do for reading on weekend

[Tunley Legend]

we seemed to change from 4-4-2 to an attacking 4-5-1 at half time with trundle pushed out onto the right and williiams tucked in.

a lot of the guys around me in dolman were dissapointed at what was perceived a negative move (only one striker left up front)

However we created much more with the five man midfield and certainly played much better. so is it better at home to play the negatively perceived 4-5-1 and play well, or go with an aggressive 4-4-2 but create little??

i reckon that maybe the 4-5-1 is the better call? only problem is now for the first time in ages we have loads of strikers to pick from. bit of a headscratcher eh? what does everryone else think we should do for reading on weekend

The whole point of a 4-5-1 played correctly is that it should give you the option of going 4-3-3 if you are on top in the game and be able to adopt the more defensive formation when you are under the cosh. Which, to me, makes it an ideal system/formation away from home. I am not so sure it works quite as well at home when teams put men behind the ball themselves although my opinion is that if Lee Johnson is selected to pick up the ball deep in front of our back four and keep it moving then we do need the three central players making a total of five in midfield.

To make 4-4-2 work properly you really need two top notch central midfield players who posess the ability to overcome three players on occasions. I wonder whether we have the calibre of midfield players necessary to make 4-4-2 work well (Noble and Williams have the indvidual footballing quality but do they have the workrate to function alongside Elliott and Johnson has the workrate but does he have the footballing quality required?).

[Nibor]

The reason it worked was because Sheff Utd's midfield were working extremely hard to close us down in our own half and the extra man there gave us the additional passing option we needed.

As with any tactic it's situational IMO. If our defenders were comfortable bringing the ball out of defence until they draw a man we'd probably not have been finding it so tough.