One of the most fiercely debated issues amongst the Norwich fan base throughout the 2013/14 campaign was the formation employed by the manager, and the seemingly inherent lack of goals which resulted from the heavily used 4-5-1. Numerous fans were desperate for there to be alterations to this set-up inside the opening ten games of the season, yet the only real break from the trend came over a period of 2-3 games toward the latter half of the Canaries’ outings and achieved relatively little.
There is the school of thought that the 4-5-1 formation was not directly at fault for our goal scoring deficiencies, but the implemented tactics and the selected personnel weren’t especially compatible with it. The two most salient features of the traditional 4-5-1 are the creative play maker that sits in the hole between the lone striker and the two central midfielders, alongside two wingers whose primary role is to find the striker (usually a target man) whenever he’s in or approaching a scoring position by peppering him with crosses and through balls. That last sentence will doubtless have set alarm bells ringing for any Canaries fan who experienced our broadly dismal performances last season as not only did we lack a true CAM, usually opting to play Howson in that position who (while an excellent player) is not Hoolahan’s heir as some once thought, but we also utilised a system of inverted wingers which severely impeded our crossing game. From this then it seems apparent that it’s not only the job of Neil Adams to select a formation for his team to play, but also to match his tactics to the intrinsic traits of that formation – something which his predecessor (Chris Hughton) failed at almost categorically.
So how do we remedy this issue? From my point of view I feel a plethora of tactical changes are crucial, as well as a slight alteration to the formation we opted for almost exclusively during the last season. If it were me charged with leading the boys in yellow from the touchline on their next run out, I’d be looking at three formations – the first being the 4-2-3-1, the second being the 3-5-2 and the third the 4-1-2-1-2.
On the face of it, this set-up doesn’t seem to differ all that much to the one Hughton used the majority of the time throughout his time at the helm, however there are two fundamental differences which I have previously mentioned. Firstly, the wingers would play on the same wing as their strong foot (Pilkington being two footed would allow him to play on either side) which would greatly further their ability to find the striker as they wouldn’t have to cut in to cross the ball, an issue which Snodgrass often exemplified in textbook fashion. Moreover, Hoolahan would replace Howson in the hole as he is an arrant creative play maker who would aid our attacking surges in the centre of the pitch to a greater extent. In an ideal world Wes Hoolahan wouldn’t be my player of choice for this role, I feel we need to sign a younger and more able player in this position – but that’s for another article. A slight variation on this setup would be to swap out the CAM for a CF or shadow striker to play behind or alongside the target man ahead of them, thus essentially changing to a 4-4-2 formation, and my choice of player for this position would be Hooper. Alternatively, a second striker could be substituted on for one of the two central midfielders, thereby effectively forming a 4-1-2-1-2.
This is certainly the less orthodox formation of the two, but one which teams such as Hull and a very young Aston Villa side saw decent success with in the Premier League last season. It’s also been the favoured formation of international teams such as Holland, Chile, Mexico and Costa Rica who all performed strongly in the 2014 World Cup and surprised many football fans. Furthermore, the current pool of Norwich players (while relatively small) is quite diverse in terms of positions they’re able to play i.e. we have players such as Olsson and Garrido who have experience as playing as flying wing backs – an essential role in this formation. In addition to this, it’s one of the few formations that would allow for us to play both a creative play maker and two strikers – a tactic that would perhaps be better implemented in the end stages of game if we’re vying for a goal, but still useful. If Adams were to opt to give this set-up a go, I’d expect it to be tested in a friendly or perhaps a cup game as it could be a catastrophe; but in a scenario where experimentation can’t really hurt where’s the drawback?
This set-up doesn’t actually differ a great deal from the aforementioned 4-2-3-1 due to the fact that one of the holding midfielders is simply swapped out for another striker. It seems likely (from what we’ve seen from Adams so far) that this will be his formation of choice this season, allowing for our attacking play to be centred around Wesley Hoolahan – by far our most creative player. This tactic should allow for Hoolahan’s key traits of incisive passing and vision to shine through, allowing him to slide balls through to our pacey wingers or the two strikers ahead of him which will hopefully result in some truly exquisite pieces of attacking football for the fans to gaze in awe at.
As a final point, the players I’ve included in these line-ups are of course subject to change with the transfer windows but I with the personnel we currently have. From a tactical standpoint, I doubt my views will shift that much with the arrival/departure of players.
