How can we expect to score when we are playing 1 vs. 4 upfront?

[Stephen Frys Evil Twin 0]

We need to stop this stupid 4-5-1 formation.

Everyone was praising it''s usefulness for Palace and Everton towards the start of the season. We were commenting that it was making them hard to break down defensively.

When we use it we still can''t defend for toffee, and we can''t score because the front man is isolated.

We are becoming the victims of our own tactical naivity. Worthy insists on playing people out of position and asking them to do jobs that aren''t part of their game.

Huckerby is asked to "track back" and defend!!!

Helveg is asked to play in midfield, he is unquestionably better at right back or centre back. His passing is decent, but he occasionally lapses into the odd blind pass which can really cause us problems.

Jonson is asked to play on the right, when he is primarily a striker. He is also asked to defend, admittedly he is better at it than Huckerby, but he compromised when we attack. Should Huckerby break with the ball on the left, Jonson is still with his man on the right, and Ashton is left isolated upfront against 4 defenders who only have to worry about him.

We were deadly on the counter attack last season, simply because we had more options going forward, you would always see Leon on the last man, ready to chase a through ball should it come, Svenno would drop into the gap between their defence and midfield to receive the ball at his feet and then look for Huckerby on the wing or Francis pushing through the middle.

This season we are asking one man to do the same thing, but against better opposition. If Huckerby was given a free role or Jonson was allowed to push further forward we''d have many more options going forward. You''ll say that this would leave us heavily exposed when we are defending, but we concede 3/4 goals anyway, and Huckerby is as good as a ghost when it comes to tackling.

Worthy, play a 4-4-2 or a 4-3-1-2 with Hucks in the gap. We''ve got to play to our strengths. We have pace, we have work-rate, we can pass the ball. Let''s get the ball out of our half as soon as possible, get Huckerby and Leon on their bikes and creating problems upfront. Supply Ashton with support and we''ll score.

[ZLF 271]

I agree that if we can supply Ashton and he will score, but this will happen whether he plays in a 4-4-2, 4-3-3, 4-5-1 or whatever system we chose to play.

As we ourselves have shown (Bolton was easily our best performance all season) the 4-5-1 can be highly effective. Every other system we have played have also had very poor performances attached to them too, it is not the system that is at fault but the choice of personnel picked to play and the roles they are playing.

At the weekend the only missing option was McVeigh in midfield - but I dont think playing him would have made any difference to the result, and as the 4-4-2 showed in the second half neither did paring Leon with Ashton, we were just as poor then and villa could have had a hatful.

Our top players, if fit, have to be on the pitch in their preferred position, playing in a formation where every player knows their role,concentrating for a full 95 mins and doing their basic job well.

We will get a win again this season - I dont know where or when or even how we will scrape it but it will happen, but will it be too late?

OTBC