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GJL Mid-Norfolk Canary

Nobody else seems to have mentioned it, so I will........

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What in hells bo**ocks what that fisrt half formation all about !!!??. Where on earth did Lambert dream that up from. We were practically asking Askou and Nelson to act as full backs wen they''ve enough on their plate doing the job of centre half. Thank god it was changed while we were still in the game, on another day we could have been out of sight!

I''ll put this one down in the name of "experimentation" but please don''t try that one again.

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Indeed. The team was too static, left the attacking players isolated and asked defenders normally more comfortable in central defence to play a full backs role. A bizarre tactic. Thank God we have a manager equally as quick to ditch what does not work as we do to experiment.

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I don''t have a clue why we done it.  We had the players there to play 4-4-2 and that is a formation in which they have played a few times recently so why didn''t we start like that!?

 

If we were playing a good team today I think we could have been given a good thumping.

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It`s great that we have a manager who is prepared to try new things, good on him, when it clearly wasnt working he changed things, thats the important point. Dont critisise him for having a go at something different.

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That formation was worth a try!

Sheffield were set up to play 10 behind the ball with midfielders looking to spring their lone striker Ched Evans through on goal. You don''t need 4 defenders to mark one player, so PL went 3 at the back from the outset. Is Russell Martin deemed to be the quickest defender we have though? ''cos he played as our lone centre-back for the first few minutes! Bit bizarre that one.

The system didn''t work well enough though - so the Manager simply adjusted. Well done (yet again) Paul Lambert!

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By the sound of things, Lambert played 4 seperate formations today: 3-4-3, 4-3-3, 4-4-2 with the diamond, finished with a flat 4-4-2.We can go on about his bizarre initial selection all we want, but at the end of the day Lambert recognised the error and changed it more than once in order to get the result, which worked.The man is a God.

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i was spitting feathers shouting at nelson for poncing about on the right while martin lounged around in the middle and lappin playing 20 yards ahead of the rest of the defence ..took me a few minutes to realise what was going on [:D]

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Didn''t go to the game but listened. For me it was a surprise, but it felt like the wrong formation for the right reasons. Sheffield basically played one upfront and their star players in the middle (Reid, Quinn, Cresswell (I guess), aren''t renowned for tracking back, so keeping our width but still with three upfront would hopefully push them back and expose them, whilst still allowing ourselves cover when we came back. It didn''t work and that was probably due to us lacking that extra width that maybe McNamee could give us, but the changes Lambert made to swing the game were the correct ones, and it shows that he''s got a great tactical eye. It also shows that he has confidence in his players to accept, and more importantly understand, his tactics and decisions, and shows that we aren''t just trying to play other teams out of games, but also to out-think them in our matches.

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I also think the tactic would have worked if we had defenders more comfortable than Askou and Nelson. Russell Martin was absolutely fine in the middle and his speed was something which snuffed out an early Chedwyn run, but they had clearly been given instructions to play it from the back over and over and Askou/Nelson are not quite as comfortable doing that as Ward, especially when Sheff Utd realised this quite early and started pressing high.

As people have said, interesting to try new things, shows a good tactical eye and also shows he isn''t afraid to ditch it when its not working.

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I think Lambert started with Russel Martin as a centre half because he knew that, with Barnett suspended, Ward injured, and Nelson and Askou replacing them, we would not have passed the ball out of defence. Ruddy clearly had instructions not to kick the ball long at the start of the match, and Martin had more touches than anyone else on the pitch as he was proving to be the link between our defence and midfield. It clearly did work, and the formation changed fairly sharpish.

Concerns for the next match are that Barnett will still be suspended, Ward may still be injured, and Lappin has now picked up a one match suspension for 5 yellows. Our back four will be tested against a strong QPR side, let''s just hope we can settle a bit quicker against them than we did against Sheffield.

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[quote user="drurys dodgy knee"] Concern for the next match , Lappin has now picked up a one match suspension for 5 yellows..[/quote]

But we''ll have Drury back at left back, presume he''s fit as he was on the bench today.

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I believe the formation was a 3-5-2 in attack and a 5-3-2 in defense with Russel Martin playing as a sweeper and Lappin and Korey Smith as Wing backs. It seemed at times that Jackson was playing ''in the hole''. It was, to put it bluntly, utterly utterly bizarre 

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it was certainly bizarre! But i could see what PL was trying to do, i think! Knowing only Evans would be upfront he wanted an extra man for attacking, hence 3 at the back.

This may have worked apart from trying to play the ball out of defence with Nelson and JBA as ball playing full backs. Now that was never going to work and as soon as Sheff U realised that they pressed higher and higher.

But at least PL realised what was wrong and changed it fairly quickly, as an experiment it failed but in PL we trust!!

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I honestly dont see how the formation made any sense. United''s key player is clearly Andy Reid and with Smith and Lappin hugging the touchline and three strikers on, Crofts and Fox got totally overran. Yes Lambert changed it in time and yes he has earnt the right to not be questioned but fuck me Korey Smith as a right wing back? The one thing it showed for me was a total lack of faith in an Askou/Nelson partnership.

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Evans plays down the middle and after his two goals against Hull we needed our quickest available defender to mark him but it didnt work as well as planned. Brave decision to change it though!

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[quote user="M.A.T.T"]Evans plays down the middle and after his two goals against Hull we needed our quickest available defender to mark him but it didnt work as well as planned. Brave decision to change it though![/quote]Not really, was a total no brainer to change it. I see what you mean but to change our whole formation against a horribly out of form team to deal with a striker who has 6 goals all season seems crazy.

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Presumably Lambert used the 5-3-2 becaues the back four was not the strongest, what with Drury and co missing, he must''ve felt that an extra defender was needed. Nothing bizzare about that. 3-4-3 was just an experiment I guess. Sheff UTD are an attacking minded team so Lambert felt that three strikers were needed in order for City to get the goals not United? or something like that, LOL.

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