A defensive-minded 4-2-3-1 for Australia
Australia, 4-2-3-1
Australia got to the first round in their first World Cup, the second round in their second World Cup, so is a quarter-final spot the natural outcome for their third World Cup?
Most of the world hasn’t seen much of Australia since 2006, and the positive for those who chose not to watch the Asian Group 1 qualifying section is that the side has changed little in the past four years. Of the expected starting XI, only Hull winger Richard Garcia was not in the squad for 2006.
The manager, however, had changed. Guus Hiddink was worshipped in Australia for the job he did in taking them to the second round (especially considering the unfortunate nature of their elimination), and also provided tactical excitement with his 3-3-3-1 formation that dominated possession against superior teams.
He has been replaced by a fellow Dutchman (and Hiddink’s former assistant at South Korea), Pim Verbeek. He has got Australia playing a more pragmatic, defensive type of football, but has won supporters over with a good run of results.
Ten clean sheets in fourteen qualification games tells you what you need to know about Australia – they play a fairly conservative 4-2-3-1 formation that depends on the three midfield runners joining the lone striker and providing a goal threat.
The first XI
The back four sees Lucas Neill joining Craig Moore in the centre, with Scott Chipperfield on the left and Luke Wilkshire on the right – the full-backs are fairly limited footballers technically (it would have been nice to see Brett Emerton at right-back) but do push forward to join the midfield and stretch the play when the wingers look to link up with the striker.
The two midfielders perform slightly different jobs – Vince Grella sits in front of the defence and looks to receive short passes from the centre-backs (who aren’t the best on the ball), whilst Jason Culina is more advanced, although rarely breaks into the penalty area, leaving that for the front four.
The central player is Tim Cahill, who is involved in build-up play slightly more than at Everton, where he often only appears in the penalty area on the end of moves. He is joined by two wingers, Richard Garcia and Mark Bresciano, who strangely has just signed for Al-Nassr.
Harry Kewell is – surprise surprise – injured, but will be in the side if fit, possibly as a winger, possibly as the striker – he played both roles in qualification. The other choice of striker is Josh Kennedy, a tall, physical but hardly prolific player who will look to hold the ball up for the midfield runners. Goals is the problem for Australia, and up against defensive sides like Ghana and Serbia, they may struggle to find the net – Cahill’s late runs into the penalty area will be the main threat.
The basic formation
Here is Australia's basic 4-2-3-1 shape. The defenders (in pink) are fairly flat, with two holding midfielders (in blue) keeping close to the centre-backs. Tim Cahill, the central of the three attackers, will probably look to pick up opposition holding midfield players, whilst coming short for passes. The two wide players drop back and form two banks of four if needed. Josh Kennedy (in green) stays upfront.
Transition from defence to attack
Here, Australia are at the transition between defence and attack. Kennedy (just out of shot in green) is isolated upfront, with Cahill having dropped back to assist the two central midfielders. The wingers have taken up fairly central positions in the defensive phase of play, making Australia fairly easy to defend against.
Counter-attacking
This counter-attack shows two of the attacking trio getting forward in support of Kennedy, but the lack of width in the attack (and the fact that the full-backs are well behind play) makes it difficult for Australia to create goalscoring opportunities. Even with most of the opposition midfield out of play, Australia are still only 3 v 5 here.
The midfield
The differing roles of the two central midfielders (in blue) is clear here - Culina (5, near side) plays in advance of Grella.
The striker
Josh Kennedy rarely presses the defenders on the ball and instead drops off close to the three attackers, which helps to narrow the gap between he and the rest of the side.
Conclusion
Another defensive-minded side in Group D – Australia will struggle for goals but should go into the final game against Serbia with a chance of progression.
Pace could catch out the back four, whilst there is limited talent on the break when Australia try and move forward from their standard defensive position.
Set-pieces may be key – Moore, Cahill and Kennedy are good in the air, whilst Neill comes forward from centre-back to offer a long throw.
A defensive-minded 4-2-3-1 for Australia
Good analysis. Highlights the numerous reasons why most avid followers here in Australia give us little chance of progressing to the second round.
One point. Wilkshire and Chipperfield are more technically proficient than you give them credit for in my opinion. Both are capable of delivering consistently dangerous crosses, even if mainly from deep. Wilkshire, besides Cahill, is arguably our most impressive player these days (if Emerton becomes fit he will slot in to Garcia’s role, not at right back.) With Kennedy fairly isolated up front though, and facing three opponents in the group stage where height in central defence is not lacking, it seems unlikely that we will achieve anything like the results of Germany four years ago.
Oh, and apparently Bresciano moving to the Middle East isn’t happening now.
Covered everything I was going to say. Aside from Cahill (and potentially a fit Emerton and Kewell), Wilkshire and Chippers offers Australia the most going forward. Discipline will be the key I feel
Agree with regards to Wilkshire. He’s not been shy in coming forward for Dynamo so far this season, and has delivered well. Likewise, he can be clever in his use of *second-balls*. I remember a game recently in which he zoomed onto the box-edge and cheekily tried scooping the ball over the ‘keeper!
Also covered everything I wanted to say! Wilkshire has been amazing recently, the big improver in the squad, and when emo is fit he’ll play on the wing. To say Chippers is not technically proficient though!! The man can play anywhere on the field, and frequently does, scores goals when up front, provides assists when in midfield,and is close to the smartest defender we have….
So where is Brett Emerton? Not in the squad, injured or on the bench? By far the most technical player of those Australians that have played regularly in the Premier League, as far as I know.
I worry group D will become a snore-fest…
The USA really exposed the Australian back line for pace in the friendly Saturday — and this on an unusually narrow field (remember the adage:”Small pitch favors defense.”). The Socceroos are a disciplined group and need to make zero mistakes to have a chance to beat technically and athletically superior opponents.
Meanwhile, I have nothing but the greatest respect and admiration for Tim Cahill. Here is a guy who has maximized his talents and has become a borderline “great” player simply by dint of his individual dedication. I think there is something very special happening at Everton — not that they will be a great club consistently, but the effort, the dedication, and the exercise of pure will is truly admirable.
I think Australia could have done some damage to Italy in added time though in retrospect that penalty was probably fair (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cS6Wqt00gTc). I really dont understand why Lucas Neil went down so quickly with Grosso seemingly going nowhere.
this year I hope Australia show a little bit more attacking instinct though the group is not the easiest possible.
Yet another good analysis from the zonal marking team, good job guys.
Just a quick gripe about all this “Australia were unfortunate” nonsense. In the 1st round against Japan Cahill should have been given a second yellow card in the process of conceding a penalty. They were also extremely fortunate that Matterazzi was sent off in the game versus Italy.
Four years ago with pretty much the same team Australia had momemts of luck with a fantastic work rate under a manager whose teams are renowned for work rate. This time they appear to be a slightly devolved side compared to 2006.
However its probable much of their attacking strategy will focus on set-pieces, although I can’t recall a nation who have ever relied primarily on set-pieces (and thus can’t compare them to anyone) if their defensive discipline lasts the full 90 minutes they might upset either Serbia or Ghana.
Greece?
Greece were more about a counter attacking strategy with pace than overly reliant on set-plays. This isn’t to say they were not useful in that department but Australia don’t have the pace that Greece had in 04 to play a swift counter attacking game.
I would expect plenty of long balls into the box from free kicks within 10 yards of half way looking for a flick on, Greece aimed long balls up to Charisteas to hold up and bring others into play – they are two similar strategies but effectivley different game plans.
As a Serb, I think if we beat Ghana, we should be able to beat Australia. They’re too weak in attack to be much of a threat against Vidic, Ivanovic and co. Cahill is I think the only real danger for us. My main concern will be goals. Our strikers our good, but none are regular goalscorers. Zigic may be useless against the Aussies, unless we can push their defensive line into the penalty area. Maybe someone like Krasic would be able to expose their lack of pace?
“The other choice of striker is Josh Kennedy, a tall, physical but hardly prolific player who will look to hold the ball up for the midfield runners.”
Had he finished one of his 2 chances inside the 6 vs the USA they would have probably gotten a draw out of the match. Any improvement over Kennedy could make the difference.
Yep pretty good analysis. I actually haven’t been able to see any of our warm up friendlies so far, but I did go to a number of the home qualifying games. One thing I noticed was that in the early phase of possession, the fullbacks quite often pushed up beyond the wingers, who drifted inside as a means of opening up the pitch. But like I said, I haven’t seen the warm up matches to see if we may have stopped that since
Just thought I would mention, Verbeek hasn`t won over all the supporters, in the last year or two a “style vs results” kind of debate has been raging on the internets in Oz and even in the mainstream press.
I think a lot of people were surprised that no-one came through the ranks in the last few years to challenge the 2006 squad members for positions.
Oh well, glad to be at the big party.
It’s interesting, Australia do have the potential to be a potent attacking team (as they were in 2006 with Hiddink), and in my opinion a more positive style would maximise their chances at the World Cup. The defensive, conservative style which served them well in Asian qualifying is likely to see them knocked out by 0-1 defeats or 0-0/1-1 draws vs Germany, Serbia and Ghana.
Kennedy is a limited front man, but in terms of creative midfielders, the Socceroos are well-stocked (Cahill, Culina, Bresciano, Kewell, and Emerton are all capable of creating/scoring goals, if they have the license to push forward). Their weakest characteristic is their defence, which is the area Verbeek has chosen to base their play on. Moore is well past it; a liability in my opinion. His lack of pace and poor decision-making will inevitably cost a goal (as it did in the recent friendly vs NZ, when he ducked under a long ball, instead of intercepting it). The fullbacks have their qualities as counterattackers, but neither are particularly adept defensively (Wilkshire is a converted midfielder). Neill carries the defence, but as Blackburn or West Ham fans would know, his lack of discipline/poor decision-making can cost you. Meanwhile, the defensive midfielder, Vince Grella, is also undisciplined and slow.
I suspect Germany will beat Australia first up, but if the Aussies eke out a win over Ghana, they could upset Serbia and advance. But they will have to be in top form, lucky, and very disciplined defensively.
I agreew with BaxterP. Socceroos have natural attacking instincts and they showed that in the 2005 Confederations Cup even before Hiddink arrived, although they also conceded many goals. What Hiddink did was to organise a solid defense structure to defend as a unit, and then made a few tactical changes to get the most out of the midfielders with a target man (Viduka). Verbeek’s very cautious approach would hurt Australia’s chance to progress beyond the group stages.
Verbeek did a good job of getting us to the finals; however prospects are not good for getting out of this group.
It’s because there was a tension between the need to have a stable [if aging] team to make sure we qualified and the risks of trying newer players and losing crucial points. The paranoids amongst Australian supporters complain that Verbeek is too cautious but it seems to me that the newer players he tried have generally not been up to standard. I think it was understandable that he should decide that we needed a defensive mindset to make sure we got to South Africa.
This year’s team is not the same strength as the 2006 version. Kennedy may be scoring regularly in the J League but he is no Viduka – although he didn’t score often he was great at holding the ball up to allow the support to arrive. We are praying that Kewell and Emerton actually get fit enough to play, they supply a large part of what creativity we have. We are weaker in central defence and holding midfield – Moore and Grella seem to be perfectly out of form. We do at least have an excellent keeper in Schwarzer.
When everyone is playing well we actually are defensively solid. This was well seen in the friendly against the Netherlands in Sydney in October 2009. However the downside [as was also seen in that game] is that we struggle to create more than a couple of decent chances per game, and we don’t have anyone who is reliable in front of goal to convert them. Scott McDonald’s club record would suggest that he should be able to do this but in practice he has been unerringly off target in the Australian shirt so has [quite reasonably] not got into the squad.
I guess every team will need luck but I expect us to need a significant amount in every game. Perhaps Verbeek is due some as I don’t think he has been lucky in the players he has to choose from this time.
Fairly accurate profile of Australia. I agree the previous poster that said that Wilkshire and Chipperfield are fairly technically capable footballers if they aren’t the fastest players going around, they seem to be pretty effective at getting quality crosses into the box.
In your profile of the 2006 Australian team under Hiddink, you make no mention of Wilkshire who would have played right midfield in front of Emerton. He started every game and it was Cahill who was coming off the bench. We might have switched to the 3-3-3-1 you mention when we were chasing the game against Japan/Croatia but for the most part I think it would have been a more conventional formation.
I’d love to hear some predictions from you, ZM.
Thanks for the great analysis, spot on as usual.
I think Pim has really struggled to get the most out of the squad, Cahill should indeed be our most potent weapon but has not replicated (recently) the heights of his domestic form with Everton for the national team. I was really disappointed that the manager has equally failed to find space in the 23 for Scott McDonald who clearly has goal scoring potential (2007/8 for Celtic). Maybe not in the first 11, but surely McDonald might offer an interesting plan B. I can imagine Kewell, Cahill and McDonald being a real threat up front, and certainly more exciting than the endless lobbing it to Josh Kennedy approach (and more aesthetically pleasing).
Describing Josh ‘Jesus’ Kennedy as “hardly prolific” might previously have been a fair statement but I believe his form over the last season for Nagoya Grampus (14/25) and for Australia (7/19) raises his status.
I also completely agree about Emerton, who my have his best years behind him, but the combination of him and Carney as rampaging full backs would definitely give Australia some fangs.
So unless Pim is able to get more out of Cahill, it’ll need divine intervention to get us out of the group stages.
I want to quote your post in my blog. It can?
And you et an account on Twitter?