MDGoonah41
Established Member
this thread comes with a number of caveats, so please read it all before making a snide remark and moving on.
* changing formation mid season is risky, especially given our perilous league position. i understand that, which means i know it isn't likely, but its a discussion topic.
here are the reasons why i ask the original question:
- our 3 best defenders are all centerbacks.
- the third best of that bunch is the captain of the team, which means he has to play every match if he is fit
- our fullbacks offer absolutely nothing going forward, and for large chunks of games/the season, have been defensive liabilities.
- most teams that set up against us do so with 1 striker, at most 1 striker and a support striker/playmaker behind. the only exception here will be the two manchester clubs.
- our lack of width now is a big problem, and having two fullbacks with non-existent attacking instinct really hampers our attack
to expand a bit, my thought is that mertesacker would play as the central of the 3 centerbacks and would sit deep, almost acting as a sweeper. kos and vermaelen's top trait is their athletic ability and ability to quickly cover. they would be responsible for attacks coming from wide areas, leaving mertesacker to deal with the central striker/attacker the other team uses.
if we play with 2 deep midfielders, 3 advanced midfielders and 2 strikers, we would still lack the width that a fullback or wide forward offers, but it would play to the strengths of our forwards, especially podolski who offers no width at all.
i envision it looking like this, given our current personnel
--- kos ------- mertesacker -------- tv ---
--------- arteta --------- wilshere -------
--- ox ---------- cazorla ----- rosicky ---
---------- walcott --- podolski -----------
ideally, we would sign someone like m'vila, push wilshere up to the bank of 3 and send rosicky or ox to the bench. even more ideally, we'd send the other to the bench as well and put a guy like turan alongside wilshere and cazorla
against teams like southampton today, was there a need to play a flat back 4? the kos/tv partnership doesn't work, mertesacker has to play. but kos/vermaelen can be useful, just not together, and probably not just pairing mertesacker alone. if we had a fullback like baines, this wouldn't be a discussion, because he is a threat going forward. gibbs is almost no threat at all, sagna is no threat at all. and unfortunately, neither is a lockdown defender anymore (gibbs never was) so are they really helping?
im sure the consensus will be that this would never work and its stupid, but im tired of talking about how ****ty gervinho is and whether or not walcott will sign a new deal, so whatever
:bounce
* changing formation mid season is risky, especially given our perilous league position. i understand that, which means i know it isn't likely, but its a discussion topic.
here are the reasons why i ask the original question:
- our 3 best defenders are all centerbacks.
- the third best of that bunch is the captain of the team, which means he has to play every match if he is fit
- our fullbacks offer absolutely nothing going forward, and for large chunks of games/the season, have been defensive liabilities.
- most teams that set up against us do so with 1 striker, at most 1 striker and a support striker/playmaker behind. the only exception here will be the two manchester clubs.
- our lack of width now is a big problem, and having two fullbacks with non-existent attacking instinct really hampers our attack
to expand a bit, my thought is that mertesacker would play as the central of the 3 centerbacks and would sit deep, almost acting as a sweeper. kos and vermaelen's top trait is their athletic ability and ability to quickly cover. they would be responsible for attacks coming from wide areas, leaving mertesacker to deal with the central striker/attacker the other team uses.
if we play with 2 deep midfielders, 3 advanced midfielders and 2 strikers, we would still lack the width that a fullback or wide forward offers, but it would play to the strengths of our forwards, especially podolski who offers no width at all.
i envision it looking like this, given our current personnel
--- kos ------- mertesacker -------- tv ---
--------- arteta --------- wilshere -------
--- ox ---------- cazorla ----- rosicky ---
---------- walcott --- podolski -----------
ideally, we would sign someone like m'vila, push wilshere up to the bank of 3 and send rosicky or ox to the bench. even more ideally, we'd send the other to the bench as well and put a guy like turan alongside wilshere and cazorla
against teams like southampton today, was there a need to play a flat back 4? the kos/tv partnership doesn't work, mertesacker has to play. but kos/vermaelen can be useful, just not together, and probably not just pairing mertesacker alone. if we had a fullback like baines, this wouldn't be a discussion, because he is a threat going forward. gibbs is almost no threat at all, sagna is no threat at all. and unfortunately, neither is a lockdown defender anymore (gibbs never was) so are they really helping?
im sure the consensus will be that this would never work and its stupid, but im tired of talking about how ****ty gervinho is and whether or not walcott will sign a new deal, so whatever
:bounce