Guest Ox Red Posted February 14, 2017 Share Posted February 14, 2017 No, not a post about former Liverpool keeper Peggy Arphexad. Or indeed a post about Wookey Hole. Or the Memorial Ground; more to do with proverbial square pegs and round holes. I was wondering what people think - are managers better served adapting formations to fit the players at their disposal, or fitting players at their disposal into their preferred formations? For instance, I always wondered why England didn't play with three at the back throughout the 2000s when, in my mind at least, we had a glut of decent centre backs and it would have better accommodated more attacking midfielders (i.e. the whole Gerrard/Lampard debate). Similarly, with a healthier sized squad then we perhaps had at the start of the season, should we play our best eleven players, or the best players in each position? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nomad Posted February 14, 2017 Share Posted February 14, 2017 If we picked our best 11 players we'd be playing with no keeper and a back line of 1. Therefore it's got be best players in each position. Even trying to shoehorn Tomlin into the starting 11 causes us issues. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tipps69 Posted February 14, 2017 Share Posted February 14, 2017 19 minutes ago, Ox Red said: No, not a post about former Liverpool keeper Peggy Arphexad. Or indeed a post about Wookey Hole. Or the Memorial Ground; more to do with proverbial square pegs and round holes. I was wondering what people think - are managers better served adapting formations to fit the players at their disposal, or fitting players at their disposal into their preferred formations? For instance, I always wondered why England didn't play with three at the back throughout the 2000s when, in my mind at least, we had a glut of decent centre backs and it would have better accommodated more attacking midfielders (i.e. the whole Gerrard/Lampard debate). Similarly, with a healthier sized squad then we perhaps had at the start of the season, should we play our best eleven players, or the best players in each position? It all depends on what players are available at that given time. Do you have players that used to be known as utility players? Or are they only able to play in their one set position? It used to be the case with utility players were that while they could play in a few different positions, they weren't exactly great in any of them & this was put down to no one, including the manager & player himself not knowing what his best actual position is. I guess we have a similar situation at the moment with Bryan & to an extent Hegeler & even more so with Magnusson (although I doubt anyone has actually seen him play left back). If you have a strong core of 14 or so players that are all able to make a team without having to play players out of position then you try to make your formation fit in with those players but it also has to be a formation that the manager & players are comfortable with. There are just too many different variables & they increase with the more players that are available. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Ox Red Posted February 14, 2017 Share Posted February 14, 2017 A discussion stemming from a peruse of the forum, about the current squad and their best positions, in particular Bryan and Magnusson, was what got me started on the subject; I for one think we have the players to predominantly start with three at the back, using wing backs and possibly an anchor (plenty of those) in front of the defence, hopefully allowing the likes of Tomlin, Paterson, Reid or O'Dowda the freedom to play on the front foot without fear that we are susceptible to being caught light on the counter attack. I appreciate that a one size fits all approach to each and every opposition isn't necessarily prudent, but seeing some of the talent that we haven't included of late just made me wonder, how can we accommodate all of our better players (yep, subjective I know) into one team more often than not. Hence the question, formation for players or players for formation. But as you point out @Tipps69, if those players then become unavailable, how far do you deviate from the plan? We do have a lot of versatile players I guess. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Septic Peg Posted February 14, 2017 Share Posted February 14, 2017 Thought this thread was about me then and my big mouth... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CheddarReds Posted February 14, 2017 Share Posted February 14, 2017 100% fit a formation for the player. Long term they might bring players in to fit their formation and philosophy but in today's game managers don't have the time to try and get players playing how they want, they have to fit around them quickly to get results. What does vary though is how different coaches view other players which obviously can change what formation they might choose with the same group of players! For example, one manager might see Magnusson as a specialist as a centre half (Johnson) whereas another might see him able to do a job at left back (I believe we had an Icelandic poster saying that's where he was covering for their national team). Specifically on the players in our squad, we should play whichever players have the best qualities to carry out the game plan to win the game rather than deciding these our are best 11 players so we always play them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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