Manchester United 3-0 West Ham: a slow start, but a comfortable victory for United
The starting line-ups
Manchester United struggled to get going, but were always comfortable after Wayne Rooney ended his goal drought from the penalty spot.
Avram Grant set West Ham out in a conservative 4-1-4-1 system, with Scott Parker deep in midfield. Grant chose to field Kieron Dyer on the left of midfield, and Luis Boa Morte in a central role. Mark Noble was the central midfielder with most license to get forward and support Carlton Cole.
As expected in a game like this, Sir Alex Ferguson continued with a broad 4-4-2 system, with Dimitar Berbatov just off Wayne Rooney. Ryan Giggs was on the left, so Nani moved to the right.
The game started at a surprisingly slow pace, with West Ham’s five midfielders sitting deep and trying to prevent United playing through them. The West Ham midfielders were told to strictly track runs from Paul Scholes and Darren Fletcher, to the point where we had near-man-marking jobs going on – Boa Morte on Fletcher, Noble higher up the pitch trying to close down Scholes. Parker swept up behind them.
United dominated possession despite their numerical disadvantage in midfield, with Patrice Evra and John O’Shea playing high up the pitch, leaving 2 v 1 against Carlton Cole at the back. But despite their dominance, United were struggling to formulate decent attacks by passing through midfield, and with Nani coming in from the right, they lacked width to get crosses into the box for their two forwards.
High defensive line
West Ham’s main problem was that they combined a conservative approach overall with a reasonably high defensive line. This meant United were able to hit long passes over the defence with some ease, and their closest two attempts in open play came from this approach – first Nemanja Vidic lofted a long diagonal ball over the West Ham defence for Berbatov, who knocked it back for Nani, whose shot was tipped onto the woodwork by Rob Green. The other opportunity was just before half-time, when Giggs chipped the ball through for Nani for a one-on-one with Green, but the Portuguese winger flicked the ball over the crossbar.
Aside from that, West Ham were neutralising the game quite well. The goal came from a penalty after Jonathan Spector’s stupid tackle on Giggs, when there were covering defenders, and can be attributed more to an individual mistake than any wrong strategic decisions from Grant.
One point of interest was how United’s approach play differed with Nani on the right, compared to with Antonio Valencia there. Valencia is much more keen to stay wide, whereas Nani likes to come inside and become involved in central build-up play. The outcome of this is that less play goes down United’s right (this was a feature of their play last season) – 31% of their passes were on the right flank against Fulham (with Valencia on the right) compared to just 22% in this match, with Nani there.
Little West Ham threat, so United comfortable in second half
The problem with West Ham’s defensive game, of course, was the fact that they weren’t getting forward to cause United much goal threat, and Cole was seen complaining on multiple occasions about his lack of support. In part this was understandable – the gap between he and the midfield was huge – but Cole wasn’t helping himself by trying to beat two defenders whenever he got the ball, rather than actually holding it up and bringing his midfield into the game. Vidic rarely had problems with him.
As the game progressed, West Ham were guilty of the mistake Newcastle made – increasingly standing off Scholes and letting him dictate the play. His influence grew and United’s overall movement and interplay was better in the second half – Nani’s goal was excellent, and at 2-0 United seemed out of sight.
Grant tried to change things by introducing Pablo Barrera for Julien Faubert (who had a terrible game) and they looked much brighter on the right. Dyer on the other side was by far West Ham’s best player, and had a very presentable opportunity at 2-0, but hit the post.
Neither side changed anything in terms of formation or tactics, and Berbatov’s close range volley from Nani’s chipped cross with twenty minutes to go was the final significant action of the match.
Conclusion
It was the right approach overall from West Ham, with the 4-1-4-1 causing United problems early on. When Noble stuck to Scholes, United seemed a little lost having depended on him for so much of their good play in the first few games of the season.
But they got two things wrong – the defensive line was very high, inviting United to knock balls over the defence, and they countered poorly – Cole seemed alien to the idea of holding the ball up.
For United it turned out to be a routine win. The Nani issue is the one interesting factor – he seemed more comfortable here on the right, but since Cristiano Ronaldo left United just over a year ago, he’s started twice as often on the left as he has on the right. What is his best position?
Manchester United 3-0 West Ham: a slow start, but a comfortable victory for United
What’s Nani’s best position?
I think he is significantly better playing down the right than down the left.
Left wing Nani is prone to running himself into cul de sacs and is an erratic crosser of the ball.
Nani is definitely better on the right than on the left. He is not predictable like Valencia who likes to take the ball to the bye-line before crossing the ball.
It was on the right Nani demolished Arsenal at the Emirates last season. On the right, Nani can run with the ball with pace and deliver. However, he tends to check himself on the left by cutting in so he can deliver the ball with his right foot.
This not only slows down the tempo of United’s attack, it also allows defenders/markers to quickly snuff out the danger.
Sir Alex should rotate Nani/Valencia on the right and play Park, Obertan/Cleverley on the left. Nani playing on the left is a waste of his talents.
I’d like to see him play ‘in the hole’ or at the tip of a midfield 3 if Utd ever switch to a 4-5-1. Although playing Berbatov and Rooney doesn’t seem to be doing any harm. I’d expect this current form of 4-4-2 to be the primary formation for Utd this season, if Berbatov keeps this up.
Did anyone notice Carrick on the ball once he replaced Scholes? He isn’t up to scratch yet.
I think the talents of Scott Parker are wasted in this system; he should play a more Scholes like role, where West Ham’s game goes through him. He has got to be seething inside at the way he is used.
Meanwhile, there were times when West Ham looked like a youth side — players dribbling into pressure, telegraphing their passes leading to easy interceptions, players standing around watching their teammates hold the ball instead to moving to support or drag opponents out of position to create space.
That’s why ManU seemed almost relaxed when WH had the ball in the middle third. Without a Scott Parker orchestrating, sooner or later the too aggressive carry or the errant pass would come, and ManUcould swiftly capitalize.
West Ham is a serious relegation candidate. Hammer fans must be horrified.
“United dominated possession despite their numerical disadvantage in midfield, with Patrice Evra and John O’Shea playing high up the pitch, leaving 2 v 1 against Carlton Cole at the back.”
“It was the right approach overall from West Ham, with the 4-1-4-1 causing United problems early on. When Noble stuck to Scholes, United seemed a little lost having depended on him for so much of their good play in the first few games of the season.
But they got two things wrong – the defensive line was very high, inviting United to knock balls over the defence, and they countered poorly – Cole seemed alien to the idea of holding the ball up.”
Just a week ago, Liverpool was said to have been tactically outplayed by Manchester City due to their central midfield of Gerrard and Lucas being unable to cope with City’s midfield three of De Jong, Barry and Y.Toure. Indeed, this superiority of having a spare man in the centre of the pitch has been advocated by none other than (possibly) the best manager in the world currently, Jose Mourinho.
That said, and taking into account the quoted paragraphs from this article, it is tempting to suggest that sending long balls over the top of the defence cancels out the numerical superiority the opposition would otherwise enjoy. In fact, it not only bypasses that spare man, it would accrue to the 4-4-2 side an additional benefit — having 2 strikers against the 2 central defenders (with the opposing wingbacks already concerned with the wingers) will in theory give them an ideal situation, since any offensive player beating their marker will theoretically send them through on goal.
Of course, the effectiveness of this supposed “tactic” is dependent on (first) the attributes and (then) the quality of the strikers. Being tall, strong and good aerial techniques wouldn’t go amiss, for example, and for the latter point, you’d rather have Drogba than say, Carlton Cole (just saying). Then again, any tactics is dependent on the ability of the players you have to carry them out — putting Xavi in a 4-4-2 will probably negate his natural strengths and effectiveness, and asking Rory Delap to lump them long balls to the Argentina squad will probably be just as useful as persuading Keane to share a hug with Vieira.
That point made, will it be premature to suggest that, perhaps, just perhaps, England playing 4-4-2, with any 2 of Crouch/Carroll/Zamora/whoever up front, can possibly outplay the likes of Spain by sitting deep – a mistake West Ham made was having a high defensive line – and catching them on the counter by – dare I say it – lumping it up the pitch?
I have to disagree. The 4-4-2 formations that have been strong this year at United and Spurs have not in any way been ‘lump it up the pitch’ teams. I really feel that the key difference is that United and Spurs have strong playmakers on the wings with Nani, Giggs, Bale and Lennon while Liverpool struggled because Kuyt and Jovanovic just do not fill this role (perhaps Maxi can). From what I have seen 4-4-2 is more effective when quickly playing the ball from sideline to sideline and advancing the ball along the wings because defenses cannot shift fast enough and each wing player has a one on one against an outside fullback. Note that Nani or Giggs were involved in each of the United goals, no defenders lumping the ball was involved.
On your point: what 4-4-2 can achieve with the spreading to the wings, variations of 4-5-1 can do too. the difference is the extra man in centre midfield, and the otherwise additional man up front occupying both centre defenders. However, should a 4-4-2 attempt this against a side employing 4-5-1, the extra man, probably the DM, have the advantage of being unoccupied by anyone to shift across to help cover their wingbacks.
Note that Spain achieved this against Holland to great effect — even with Busquets almost doing a man-marking job on Sneijder and following all over the pitch, Alonso could afford to shift over to the left to aid Capdevila against Robben, effectively stopping him from cutting onto his favoured left foot.
In spite of Holland also employing a three man midfield, two of them, Van Bommel and Mr. Karate are effectively taken out of the equation when they attack, since their task was primarily to sit back and stem any possible counter attacks. They hardly threatened offensively, meaning Spain had not much to contend with from the both of them. That meant that, with Busquets already marking Sneijder, coupled with Robben isolated against two to three men, Holland had hardly any creative outlet.
The point is this: against a two man midfield, their advantage is all the more significant — even if either of the two centre midfielders can spread the ball to the wings fast enough, the opposing centre midfielder can almost always afford the extra man to cover either of the wingers. This makes it extremely difficult for a winger in a 4-4-2 to enjoy a 1v1 situation against his marker. (Note that even in the rare 1v1s, a winger will not be able to beat his marker all the time, exacerbating the problem.)
In a 4-4-2, the advantage is still in having 2 main strikers against 2 centre defenders. In my opinion, asking one of your strikers to drop back and mark the DM is kind of a hindsight move. If that is indeed the purpose, why not play with a 3 man midfield, with the AM designated to mark the opposing (playmaking) DM? More often than not, a striker’s marking and tackling ability ain’t great. Moreover, his primary role is to score goals. By employing him merely to occupy the DM, his energy will instead be mainly spent on tracking the DM. If he doesn’t do so, he risks doing what Nolan did against Manchester United — in an attempt to support Carroll against Vidic and Evans, he stopped tracking Scholes, which he did to great effect initially, and allowed Scholes (the playmaking DM in question) to “grow in influence”.
If a manager intends to play a 4-4-2, there must be some reasons. Perhaps he lacks the right players for a 4-5-1. Or perhaps he just have a pair of two fantastic strikers (Yorke and Cole, anyone?) whose value to the team is tremendous. If that should be the case, then the manager should play 4-4-2 to its strengths, instead of accomodating the formation’s weakness and the opposing formation’s strength. In the long run, doing so is only playing to the opponent’s strength.
I am definitely not saying that managers should foolishly and stubbornly employ a favoured formation and stick to it regardless. That is indeed my point for the original post — if one intends to play a 4-4-2, (and it has been said in many quarters that the English players are far more comfortable playing in a 4-4-2), then devise ways to cope with the opponents’ strengths by using your own strengths, instead of covering whatever spotted weakness on hindsight. If Manchester United managed to employ a 4-4-2 successfully against its supposed nemesis 4-5-1 (or any variations), then it’d be interesting to note the reasons why, for Manchester United certainly did not play to West Ham’s game.
Perhaps they play 4-4-2 because they have many fantastic wingers. Arshavin for Arsenal, Messi/Henry for Barca and Villa for Spain were all in the “winger” role in their 4-5-1/4-3-3 variation systems. I don’t see that many 4-5-1 systems with two legitimate wingers while 4-4-2 often seems to operates that way. I think that 4-5-1 coaches often worry about only having one true striker and five true midfielders on the field.
You say “If a manager intends to play a 4-4-2, there must be some reasons. Perhaps he lacks the right players for a 4-5-1.” This begs the question, by phrasing it this way you assume that the manager would rather play 4-5-1 but cannot(which I think was the case with Liverpool), while perhaps the manager intended to play 4-4-2 all along(which I think was the case with United).
Also remember that Manchester United’s 4-4-2 completely bossed Chelsea’s 3 man midfield in the Community Shield. Basically, we dont allow the numerical advantage any significance by getting one our wingers tucking in very narrow (mostly the left sided one as Evra has the energy to be up and down the touchline providing width) and also through the centre, Berbatov (or in the Chelsea game it was Owen) coming very deep amd occupying the defensive midfielder. Also note that Fletcher and Scholes tend to stay very deep, drawing in the other 2 midfielders, thusly leaving a bigger gap between them and the defensive midfielder, which normally one of our inward tucking left winger (Park/Giggs) would make use of that space. Against West Ham, we had both wingers tucking in and coming thus, by outnumbering West Ham through sheer movement, many moves were orchestrated through the middle.
Defensively it also works, because often the spare man in midfield (normally defensive) is hassled by whatever in ward tucking winger he is closest too.
Fergie is almost like Sacchi in the way he gets his players to make use of space. He can play a 4-4-2 and STILL effectively outnumber packed midfields.
Amazing that managers are quite happy to let Scholes have time on the ball as the match wears on. Newcastle tried to stop him, but couldnt keep the pressure up for 90 minutes. West Ham it seemed, didnt want to try close down his space either, and so, as you put it “his influence grew”.
What the point of setting your team out to dominate midfield (i.e. Five in midfield) when those same players wont see to negating the oppositions main threat in that area? Strange. I keep waiting for a team to finally realise that Scholes runs the team when he is in such fine form.
Obviously the dangerous runs from Fletcher and Evra are also a distraction, Berbatov dropping deep seemed to confuse the Hammers also.
Still its not an excuse to leave such a fine artist paint the canvas however he sees fit.
Though Nani’s best position is on the right ,it would mean Valencia on the bench if Nani were to start,they are both two completely different players one an out and out wide man in Valencia while a tricky player in Nani who’s consistency has been in much doubt.
Sir Alex sure has a dilemma on his hands to quote the great man himself “It’s a problem for me because he prefers playing on the right, but [Antonio] Valencia’s form has been outstanding too. It gives us a bit of a problem.”
However with Giggs is not going to start every game ,and Obertan /Cleverly not yet first team regulars I am sure we will see quite a few games in which Nani starts on the left meaning Valencia comes in on the right.
All that we can say so far is that Valencia & Park did not work as a combo. Nani, Giggs and Valencia should rotate as the three wide players and Park would be used in the middle when playing a 4-5-1 if I were managing the squad. I think Sir Alex’s biggest problem is that he doesn’t have any rotation happening in central midfield and I doubt that Scholes & Fletcher will be able to start all games.
ZM, have you ever considered analyzing any MLS teams/games? Having a look at NY would be particularly interesting now that they have Henry, Angel, and Marquez.
this isn’t a tactical observation, but surely spector is on of the worst players to have ever played at this level. as a full-back myself, every time i see him play i think to myself, ‘i could have made it in this game’ – and i’m awful
I saw Spector as youth player — he was highly touted (as a forward) even then but I always thought “what’s the big deal.” As a U17 national teamer, he was switched from forward to defense, and blossomed — to the point where he was picked up by ManU. I saw him play at the Dallas Cup with the u17s and he was very good in the back.
I thought the beginning of his career at WH he was doing OK. Inconsistent, but to be expected for a youngster. And he always had good footskills, and does send a very nice flighted ball, a must for a fullback.
But I think he has gotten slower. I also saw the USA national team play Mexico in the Gold Cup final at Soldier Field in 2008, and Andres Guardado made Spector look like a statue. Then in the runup to the World Cup, his performance continued to decline and he saw no minutes at all in the tournament.
It is puzzling how his career has spiralled down. He is, by all accounts, a hard worker and very bright, but perhaps some of the injuries he has had over the past couple of years have taken their toll. Who knows? As a fan of the US National team, I want our players playing in the EPL. I hope he can turn it around.
Another good review, i like this system and both wingers ability on the ball along with nani’s movement inside means the central midfielders are unsure of who to pick up and become occupied/tired with him then they leave scholes with too much space and he does what he does best. It will be interesting to see fergie use his 4-5-1/4-3-3 in the bigger matches and what roles he will give to the wingers, will he use rooney in the flase 9 role that he thrived on last year and have nani/valencia/park/giggs making lots of outside to inside runs
“What is his best position?”
On the right I’d say, it’s only because Valencia has to be accommodated as well that Ferguson continues to start Nani on the left. I don’t think he’d have bought Valencia had he known Nani would have matured so much in the last 7-8 months, Valencia’s signing seemed like an admission that Nani wasn’t developing as expected.
I think there is more to buying Valencia than that. They had sold Ronaldo who was bought as a winger and Rooney was often played on the wings. I think that this points to the fact that their rotation of wingers was not deep enough. Signing Valencia lets Rooney replace Ronaldo up top and gives an option when Giggs or Nani need a day off.
Hi ZM
Thanks for another great article.
Could I request that you put up a page with a list/table/graph showing how the main formations line up against each other, and what their strengths/weaknesses are? (eg. 4-4-2 v 4-3-3, 4-2-3-1 v 3-4-3 etc).
I know you’ve described the virtues of various formations, but it’d be good to have one place to go to compare them all.
Thanks,
V
I wonder how Nani would do playing centrally off Rooney in a 4-2-3-1.
Playing him on the left is frankly a waste of his talents. He is half the player on the left that he is in the right. He also offers so much more (going forward at least) down the right than Valencia does. It may be worth a try giving him a go as the central player and see how he does there.
Does anyone here think that there is a strong similarity in the manner in which Utd’s Rooney, Berbatov and Nani played like Dunga’s triangle of Fabiano, Kaka and Robinho respectively? In Utd’s case the players are so interchangeable and fluid that it is extremely difficult for opposing defenders to pick a man. The rest of the Utd team seems also to have a similar structure to Dunga’s Brazil with Giggs playing a comparable role to Ramirez, though rather than a two defensive midfielders SAF’s team has Fletcher and a more creative Scholes playing as a deep lying playmaker. Thoughts?
Yeah, I get what you mean. Our 4-4-2 does tend to be rather lopsided with the left winger essentialy being a playmaker and tucking in, seen as every will always bomb forward and provide width. The only difference from that Brazil side is our playmaker is a lot deeper.
Boring of premier leagues one-sided games reviews..