"Frameworks For Freedom” sounds more like a conference paper than a magazine
so perhaps FourFourTwo, the publication, will not be changing its name. As
an encapsulation of English football, however, 4-4-2 is no longer any more
real than Roy of the Rovers. Seven English sides played in Europe last week,
all gained a result, and only two used the formation traditionally
associated with John Bull. Of them, only Tottenham normally use 4-4-2.
Everton tend to be a 4-5-1 side but will adapt depending on the situation.
“Flexibility has replaced rigidity,” Andy Roxburgh, Uefa’s technical
director, observes. “I describe the systems used in the modern game as
frameworks for freedom.”
So, is it time to convene a funeral? Get together all the “big man/little man”
strike partnerships of the 1980s, all the “out-and-out wingers” of bygone
days, dress George Graham and Graham Taylor in black and have Egil Olsen as
the priest? Have we witnessed the death of 4-4-2? Fabio Capello made his
name with an AC Milan side that played the old formation better than any
club in history, and yet his first action as England manager was to scrub
clean the chalk-board which had remained untouched in the Three Lions
dressing room since 1966 and wipe out 4-42.
Even Sven-Göran Eriksson, whose adherence to it could seem maddening when he
was a predecessor of Capello with England, is playing with a lone striker
nowadays. Kevin Keegan, after using three at the back for years, has just
latched on to 4-4-2 - ultimate proof, surely, that it must be defunct.
Well, not quite. As the comedy mug might read: Old Systems Never Die, They
Just Shut Down For A While. Chelsea, considering trying Didier Drogba and
Nicolas Anelka as a pairing, may use 4-4-2 in today’s Carling Cup final and
Spurs almost certainly will. There may not be anyone more on top of tactical
trends than Roxburgh, whose elite managers’ forum is a privy council for the
game’s leading coaches, and whose study groups scruti-nise major
international and club tournaments from a technical point of view. “In the
last World Cup, 20 out of the 32 nations used 4-4-2 so you can’t say it’s
dead, although in keeping with the tendency to adapt, Italy moved towards a
single striker system which they used in the semi-finals and final,”
Roxburgh says. “In last season’s Champions League a slight majority of clubs
in the last 16 played 4-4-2, but in the last round of games 10 of the 16
clubs played with one up. 4-4-2 is still around but maybe what you can claim
is that highly structured 4-4-2, using twin-striker play, and players going
in straight lines, is diminishing.”
Previously when there was a major change in the game’s favoured formation,
something seismic happened. In 1925 the offside law altered and “WM”
(3-2-2-3) was invented. In the early 1950s Hungary rampaged through Europe
using a deeplying centre-forward, Nandor Hidegkuti, and 4-2-4 was born. Sir
Alf Ramsey won the World Cup without wingers and although England’s
formation in 1966 was as much 4-3-3 as 4-4-2, the concept of the latter
emerged. This time no single player, coach or event has come along to change
football, it is more that managers are responding to general developments:
in fitness, players’ physiques and technical ideas.
If anyone led the way it was France, who conquered the world in 1998 despite
having a forward line comprising a solitary, mediocre striker. Stephane
Guivarc’h was an honest trier but behind him, Zinedine Zidane, Youri
Djorkaeff and Christophe Dugarry (soon replaced by Thierry Henry, with David
Trezeguet supplanting Guivarc’h) were uncontainable.
“There have always been certain ways of setting up sides,” says Roxburgh.
“There is the team that sticks to the well-estab-lished formation. Inter
Milan, who play 4-4-2, are an example. There is the set system influenced by
the philosophy of the coach, as we’ve seen with Frank Rijkaard bringing
Dutch ideas to Barcelona’s style. There are teams, such as Real Madrid, who
build around stars. And there is the whole flexible thing, where a team
changes according to the game, the situation, the stage of the competition.
The flexible approach is gaining ground.”
Roxburgh was at Anfield on Tuesday and noted how Liver-pool finally broke down
Inter by putting on Peter Crouch and Jer-maine Pennant alongside Fern-ando
Torres and Dirk Kuyt, playing diagonal balls into the box, and going to what
was almost 4-2-4. On Wednesday he was at the Emirates stadium. “There was
incredible flexibility in the game,” he says. “For AC Milan, somebody like
Clarence Seedorf can start on the left, move into the middle and end up on
the right. Paolo Maldini was up front joining a counter-attack at one point.
Both teams had a lone striker with players – Kaka and Alex Hleb – floating
between midfield and the forward line.”
Coaches, especially foreign ones, now talk about “blocks” as much as
formations. AC Milan, where it is Seedorf’s job to join Kaka and Alexandre
Pato when moves begin, play a “seven-three” block – seven defenders, three
attackers – and yet can be impossible to pin down. “Rigidity still exists
defensively, perhaps even more so, with nearly every team using four at the
back and many using two screening midfielders,” says Roxburgh. “These
defensive blocks are so good that attacking systems have to be fluid to
succeed. And there is more need than ever for the soloist, the player like
Kaka or Cristiano Ronaldo who beats the system. What you see less of is set
methods when attacking.”
Manchester United versus Lyons, like Arsenal against Milan, was a meeting of
sides playing fluid variants of the 4-2-3-1 system France used in 1998.
United had a “four block” of forwards in a diamond, starting with Wayne
Rooney at the tip, Anderson at the base, and Ronaldo and Ryan Giggs
flanking. They ended with Carlos Tevez in the Anderson position and Nani
replacing Giggs, but throughout players rotated: sometimes Ronaldo played
through the middle, occasionally Rooney was in midfield. Sir Alex Ferguson
has erroneously been portrayed as a 4-4-2 manager during his career but even
with Aberdeen in the 1980s his players were hard to categorise, such as
Gordon Strachan, who started on the right of midfield but wasa playmaker
rather than winger.
“Alex has always had principles: attack boldly, use wingers if you’ve got them
and overlapping full-backs. Any system he uses has that. United today have
still got attacking full-backs and wide men but they start with one up
rather than two,” Roxburgh says. “However, if it’s not working, Alex won’t
hesitate to put two up or change things another way. He’s got a wonderful
line about coaching during games. ‘You must find a solution,’ he says.”
Flexibility-flexibility-flexibility, not 4-4-2, is the new message.
From WM to lone stikers: the evolution of football systems
1930 3-2-2-3 (WM)
The champions in 1925-6 were Huddersfield, managed by Herbert Chapman. His
great innovation was the ‘WM’ lineup, switching the centre-half, previously
a creative midfielder, into the backline.
He perfected his system with Arsenal five times champions in the 1930s
1958 4-2-4
Brazil used 4-2-4 to win the 1958 World Cup, but it was introduced to them by
Hungarian coach Bela Guttmann. He saw the system emerge in his homeland,
where it was developed to make the most of a golden generation of players.
The key man was Nandor Hidegkuti, right, a ‘withdrawn striker’ who hit three
goals when Hungary beat England 6-3 in 1953
1966 4-4-2
That this system dominated English football for so long is understandable,
given it was born from the tactics used by Sir Alf Ramsey to win the 1966
World Cup. Ramsey responded to his lack of world-class wingers by playing
with a narrow midfield where three players (Bobby Charlton, Martin Peters
and Alan Ball) were all attack-minded and sufficiently flexible to support
strikers Geoff Hurst, right, and Roger Hunt. The 1966 formation can just as
easily be characterised as 4-3-3, but the principles were established – twin
strikers, a flat back four, and wide midfielders in place of out-and-out
wingers
1990 5-3-2
The concept of the ‘sweeper’ was only belatedly (and briefly) embraced in
Britain after years of use on the continent, especially in Germany. Bobby
Robson brought it to the England team during the 1990 World Cup finals, when
he was persuaded by players to introduce Mark Wright as a ‘spare’ centre
back, playing alongside Des Walker and Terry Butcher. The competition was
won by Germany who used 5-3-2 to the full, with Klaus Augenthaler, left, as
sweeper. They won Euro 96 employing similar ideas
2008 4-1-2-3
Modern systems – and there are several – are designed with two considerations
paramount: pitch coverage and flexibility. Playing two strikers in the
centre is seen as a luxury. The modern striker is adaptable enough to work
alone, with Chelsea’s Didier Drogba and Wayne Rooney, right, of
Manchester United and England prime examples. Fabio Capello, who preferred
4-4-2 at AC Milan, used 4-1-2-3 in his first England game
