Agreed, 4-2-3-1 is the most common formation

used in the Premier League today, but different teams use in different ways. To be effective as an attacking formation you *have* to win the ball higher up the pitch, otherwise the striker gets too isolated.

But we've seen a few times recently big teams playing very deep and successfully defending - Chelsea and Celtic against Barca for example - so you can see why it's tempting.

Our downfall when we play deep is the total lack of pace to break. When we had the ball yesterday, there was a complete lack of movement ahead of the player with the ball. To do it effectively, you need a more mobile striker than Holt with *enough* pace to make it work by running the channels. Holt is overweight and slower than he was. He's still influential in a number of ways, but he's disappointed me this year with his application.

Posted By: duke of york, Mar 3, 15:34:08