My fourth and last case study in Dutch academy football concentrates on formations. More specifically, I’ve looked at two formations used in the U18’s of several clubs. This analysis focuses on the theory of what’s good and what’s not so good about the 4-3-3 formations and the 4-2-3-1 formations. In part I: 4-3-3
These two formations have been used the most by the teams in the U18 leagues I’ve observed and in this analysis I will focus on a few things:
The defensive role of the midfield: double or single pivot
The attacking role of the midfield: the number ’10’
Pressing from the front
Often formation is used by media and fans as something that is static, as if each players holds a specific position – but as you may have seen or know, they are rather fluid and change within the game. But the roles asigned to players in a system, that’s what’s important in a game.
In this analysis I will focus on what I’ve observed in the games I’ve seen in the U18 league. This might be different to what senior sides do and the decisions made in attack, defence and transition can therefore be different than what is best, but this analysis looks at what happened.
The 4-3-3
When one of the teams played a 4-3-3 in the U18 leagues, it was constructed as in the image above. A back four with one defensive midfielder (#6) and two midfielders higher up the pitch. Usually this was one central midfielder and one attacking midfielder. On top there was an attacking trio of one striker and two wingers, who usually made runs down the line and delivered crosses to the striker and the attacking midfielder moving up the pitch.
With the 4-3-3 formation you make use of the wings from your wing-attackers as you can see in the image below. The wingers move into the white positions on the wing and are tasked initially with providing crosses into the box, where the number 9 is moving towards.
But that is not their only task. They are trained and have been instructed to look for the attacking midfielder(s) entering the zone just behind the box, also know as zone 14. This is a position from where a lot of goalscoring threat is created via through passes or shots.
In this case the number 10 is very active and committed to be involved in the attacking play of the side with the possession of the ball and the number 7 is a bit more conservative in the case possession is lost and the transition from attack to defence happens.
Now attacking via the flanks can be a great threat to the opponent’s goal, but can give disadvantages as well. When the wingers are very well defended, it can leave the striker to be isolated and he has no support. The number 10 in this case won’t make the run forward, but makes himself available to receive a pass.
The wingers also need to be very aware of their defensive positioning: blocking pass lanes and trailing back. If they don’t do that, the opponent’s full backs have a lot of space to progress into the middle third of the pitch.
Illustrated in the image above is how the attacking midfield acted in a scenario when the ball was with the team analysed. In this 4-3-3 there was one defensive midfielder or a single pivot, who was tasked with the defensive duties and acted as the defensive unit with the four-man defence.
The 4-3-3 does well with the ball because of their presence in the central zones of the pitch and can translate that into dominance. But also in in defence, this formation provides an advantage with 3 midfielders, they defend the central zones of the pitch well and its difficult for the opponents to progress in the middle. And, when the opponent wants to progress via the flanks, they can usually only use one flank – as the other one can be pinned by one of the midfielders.
Talking about defence, a 4-3-3 in defence usually switched to a 4-4-2 in these games observed. This also can be seen in the image above. This makes the defensive block stronger, but in transition from attack to defence there is a big risk: when they play with one defensive midfielder, that player has to be disciplined in his positioning – when he is pulled away from his position, it opens space in the middle and that can lead to dangerous situations in the defensive third.
The 4-3-3 changes into a 4-4-2 in defence and what I’ve seen is that the two strikers in this formation (one striker and one winger) press the defence together. The four-man midfield rarely presses before the middle third and when they do, they do it as a unit.
It was a very interesting to see how a 4-3-3 moved and changed within different phases of the game. The U18’s are very close to what senior sides decide on the pitch, but the order of things is not always correct.
*The tactical images are made with Tactical Pad, which gave me the freedom to alter the pitch just like I wanted to.
This is another case study I have conducted in the Dutch U18 and U21 leagues in the years 2019 and 2020. I have seen a lot of matches in these divisions and previously wrote on the use of inverted full-backs – which you can read here.
I’m sticking with the theme of the defense as this is something developing in the Netherlands. We have developed world class central defenders over the years and in the academies there seems more interest in developing good, stable defenders with an eye for the attacking phase of the game. This analysis focuses on the role of the ball-playing central defender and will look at two different passing options: the long ball and the ball breaking the lines.
Before I start, I want to make clear that this concerns the U18 and U21 leagues of the Dutch system which contains several high placed amateur teams. Their first teams might play Tweede Divisie, Derde Divisie or Hoofdklasse – but because their academies play at a certain level, they have been included in this level. The followings clubs have been included in this research:
VVV-Venlo
MVV Maastricht
Fortuna Sittard
Roda JC Kerkrade
FC Volendam
NEC Nijmegen
Vitesse Arnhem
FC Groningen
PEC Zwolle
Heracles Almelo
Almere City FC
Cambuur Leeuwarden
De Graafschap
RKC Waalwijk
Willem II
Go Ahead Eagles
SC Heerenveen
Feyenoord Rotterdam
Sparta Rotterdam
FC Den Bosch
Alexandria ’66
Spartaan’20
AFC Amsterdam
Zeeburgia
FC Dordrecht
Alphense Boys
SBV Excelsior
Koninklijke AFC
Ajax Amsterdam, PSV Eindhoven, FC Utrecht and AZ have been looked at too – but as their U21/U23 team plays in the Eerste Divisie (2nd tier), they have not been included as they are already in the professional system.
In this analysis I will not name which teams play with which intention, but I look at the systems that I’ve seen in my time watching the club This is case study to assess what the results where and what went good/bad – instead of looking at which team/club does it better and has the best player etc.
The reason why I have chosen for the U18 and U21 teams is as follows: the players that are in the academy at that age have the highest percentage of making their professional debut or playing for a semi-professional team, which uses progressive ideas and standards that the professional teams do as well.
A last disclaimer; I don’t pretend this is the best way to conduct research into this theme or that the tactical concepts are good or bad – I call it like I see it and I want to offer insights into the practical implementation of this concept in the two highest youth leagues in the Netherlands.
The theory
As Dutch academies are mostly brought up with the idea that they will play with a four-man defence, the centre back needs to possess certain qualities when in possession of the ball. In the image below you can see what the behaviour of the centre backs and full back usually are.
As you can see the number 2 and 3 (not traditional numbers) are playing in the heart of the defence and have several options. In the Netherlands we often play in a safe “U-formation” which means that the left full back will pass to one of the centre backs, who on his turn will play the ball to the right full back – and so on. This is a rather safe view. The full back will move up the field in order to start or take part in the attack, but only in combination with the defensive midfielder in the 4-2-3-1 or 4-1-2-3 formation. Only the defensive midfielder and one (or both) full back will move forward, with the central duo staying back in order for the rest defence.
In this rather traditional and conservative approach, the central defenders don’t need to have the quality of picking someone out on the midfield or to be able to play a correct ball to the attacking players. This has been changing more and more. Obviously there have been ball-playing central defenders for decades, but it hasn’t always been actively coached in academies.
In this current view the central defender must be able to do two passing options well:
The ball played through the middle from the defence to attack or attacking player
A long, unforced, ball to a striker/targetman or a winger
A forced long ball is something that can be seen in all matches when the opponent presses the central duo and he is forced to play it long – that’s not a characteristic of the things I want to point out.
Through the middle
A pass through the middle on itself is just that, a pass through the middle. For a central defender to make that pass gives some risk in itself – if the pass is inaccurate or there is an interception, it will lead to a big chance for the attacking players of the opponent. So before a central defender can make that pass – as seen in this case study – a few things would occur in the positioning of said defender.
In the image above you can see a scenario that happened a lot in all of the academies. The right central defender gets the ball and doesn’t pass to his other central defender, goalkeeper or either full backs – but makes a move up the pitch from the defensive third to the middle third. As a consequence, things have been set in motion position-wise for other players.
It’s important to stress that formations are a good reference point of how to maintain structure, but in reality the formation can behave differently. The formation is not always in sync and that’s why for example one full back can remain in his natural position and have a position higher up the field without actually making a run down the line or maintaining a high line.
With the central defender on the ball and making a move up the pitch, a few things are set in motion. First of all the right full back will leave his position and asume the position of central defender, to make movement for the ‘number 2’ to move up the pitch. As a consequence of that the attacking midfield duo wil be altered, as the ‘number 8’ will go wide and the sole defensive midfielder will move into that attacking midfield.
The flaws in this logic could be seen when an opponent recovers the ball and in the transition from attack to defense, a lot of players were out of their position of comfort, and a numerous of bad mistakes were made – leading to confusion for the central duo and goalkeeper. But when executed correctly, the team on the ball could assert dominance on the midfield with a central defender spreading passes deep into the final third.
In the case that the central defender moves up to the position of defensive midfielder, it would look like illustrated in the image above. Obviously, the player can choose to play it short or back, but that takes the progressive idea out the attack – so I will not focus on that. I have seen the right central defender making three choices in general:
Pass the ball into the feet of the left-winger. After he received the ball, the number 9 and number 11 would go into the box, and the midfield would be restored: the central defender would go back to his position and the number 10 and number 8 would move into zone 14, anticipating a cross or pull back pass.
Pass the ball straight forward between the lines with the striker receiving the ball and holding it. He would look for options to distribute to the flanks, or to wait for the attacking midfield duo to move up the pitch. This would only happen with a certain type of striker who was strong in holding the ball and strong in the link-up play.
Pass the ball to the right-winger. This was not done in the same manner as with the left-winger, as this pass was played in an area and not into the feet. This meant that the right-winger had space in front of him and used his pace to get to the ball in order to deliver a cross.
It’s worth noting that this specific set of passes was conducted in this example by the right central defender, but was done equallly by the left central defender. This means that the pass to the left-winger was in a specific area and the pass to the right-winger was into the feet.
An unforced, long ball
Before I look at the long ball through the air, I will make a distinction between to different long balls. The first one is the forced, long ball. Above I have mentioned this as well, but a long ball is played by almost every defender looked at in this research when under pressure. When the opponent would press aggresively and there were no short passing option, the defenders would kick the ball long.
In this part of the analysis, I won’t look at that particular long ball – but I will look at the chosen ball from the defensive third. The concept behind this ball was different in the positioning of the central defender in question. In the image below you can see the positioning where the majority of the central defenders stood when releasing that chosen ball.
Different in the positioning of the central defender in this scenario is that there is no change in position as we have seen above. The right/left full back would move a bit closer to the central defenders, but that was it. What really caught my eye was that it was almost always the same central defender going into that zone and give the long ball. There were not many teams with two central defenders with a good long ball and they chose to let one central defender give the long balls and one defender to actively engage in the build-up from the back.
When the central defender moved up to that specific area he would scan for options and a vital role was set for the three attackers in the 4-3-3 or the wingers in the 4-2-3-1 formation. This can also be seen in the image below.
The central defender in the specific area has two main option to pass the ball to – these are illustrated by the four arrows, two for each option:
Pass the ball long to the wingers. They would receive the ball on the flanks and either make a run down the line and provide a cross into the box or cut inside and trying to give a through ball to the striker.
Chip the ball to the white areas illustrated on the image. This would be an area the striker would move into and in doing so, create an opportunity for the other flank to cut inside.
The long ball is a pass full of risk, because the ball travels longer and that means that there is more time to intercept. The success rate of the balls was significantly lower than an a pass on the ground, but one thing really stood out. The teams that kept on trying to give those ball were the teams that posed more threat to the opponent’s defence. They knew that one of those balls would be good and that immediately gave them an advantage in the box.
There isn’t a big conclusion to this story. I studied a lot of games and made notes on how the central defenders conducted their passes in order to progress from the back. The game is a total game with a defender contributing to the attacking phase of the game and an attacker contributing to the defending side of the game. This make it incredibly interesting to see and especially at academy level.
Brexit. The word has been used so much that SEO on websites must be greener than green. It will change the recruitment strategy of clubs a lot. In this article I will look at the changes this will give British clubs in looking at European players on mainland Europe and how this will affect how Dutch clubs will recruit in their own country.
After reading this piece on The Athletic by Philip Buckingham, I started to wonder what the effects will be for British clubs going forward. They can’t just simply sign anyone anymore from Europe and if they want to sign players from Portugal, The Netherlands and Belgium (for example), the players have to meet certain criteria.
The FA states the following:
“Post Brexit, clubs will not be able to sign players freely from the EU. Players from EU countries who want to play in the Premier League or EFL will be required to gain a GBE, like all other overseas players without the right to work in the UK.
The GBE will operate a points-based system, where points are scored for senior and talented young players based on: • Senior and youth international appearances • Quality of the selling club, based on the league they are in, league position and progression in continental competition • Club appearances, based on domestic league and continental competition minutes
Players accumulating the requisite amount of points will earn a GBE automatically, while players just below the threshold may be considered for a GBE by an Exceptions Panel.“
The Football’s Governing Body Endorsement (GBE) will have an impact on players wanting to coming to the Premier League or EFL or the clubs that want to recruit them. Furthermore, the British clubs can’t sign a player earlier than his 18th birthday and the number of U21 players signed in a transferwindow is limited (three in january 2021, six in the windows to come).
This means that it will become more difficult for a majority of the players in the Dutch professional leagues, to get recruited by clubs inside the UK. Obviously this means a change in a lot of things, but it can provide some positives for the Dutch clubs.
What positives can we see in this turning point?
Looking at it with a Dutch club’s perspective, this means that many players are more approachable. In reality, clubs could scout and try to recruit in their own country, but players have become too expensive. In what way? If clubs in England, Wales and Scotland are looking for talent in the 2nd tier – their value goes up. That’s the way it goes. If a top 2nd tier club or Eredivisie club wants to recruit them, they have to paint a scenario that’s brighter or better than that of the clubs from the British Isle – very hard to do.
With the British clubs out of the way of recruiting in the 2nd tier or in some cases, the Eredivisie – it could provide an opportunity for top table Eredivisie clubs to recruit in the 2nd tier. You could take more time look at the players and judge them in the same culture as your club is acting in.
There’s the thing of other countries obviously. There are big clubs in France, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Spain and Poland who also love to look to talent in the Netherlands. They operate within the EU and can still recruit in the same way as before – the competition has just become less in numbers.
What has to change in wages?
To become more attractive to talents/players and their agents, the clubs have to change one crucial thing: the wages. This is not simply changed obviously. There is next to no money left for clubs to spend extra on wages and the league does not provide the vast amount of money the big 5 leagues have to offer.
Players from the Championnat National in France do make more money in wages than the average player in the Eredivisie – so that has to change in order to be more appealing to the players in terms of wages. There has to change something structural to be able to compete with the aforementioned leagues – otherwise the players will choose to go abroad and play for non-Dutch teams.
It’s still hard to recruit the toptalents in the 2nd tier, but the chance of signing a player has become slightly bigger with Brexit.
2020 is coming to a close and it’s time to reflect on the past year. Well, that’s what we are told to do and reflect on the whole COVID-19 situation. That’s something interesting for sure, but I wanted to focus on a bit of a strange position I find myself in: I’m working in recruitment and analysis for the club I’ve supported since I was a young boy.
During the 2014-2015 season, a friend and I, revamped the website Venlonaren.net and made it the biggest fan platform about VVV-Venlo. We wrote loads of articles, went to every training and visited every game. Home and away. We were at every event and visited important meeting, where we were represented as stakeholders of the club. The greatest achievement we got at the end of that season: we were asked to work part-time in the media & press office of VVV-Venlo. I couldn’t have been more happy. I never dreamt of doing such a thing and now I was involved with the club I love the most.
The 2015/2016 was immense for me. We finished above all expectations, second of the league and while we didn’t get promoted at the end of the season – we were well on our way to the Eredivisie again. The 2016/2017 season was all about promotion and becoming champions: we were back! The story continued for me and although the responsibilities were different in the Eredivisie, the 2017/2018 season was amazing for me – and also the last season where I was involved in this capacity with the first team. I moved to Rotterdam and did nothing spectacular for the club – I concentrated on my website and tried to give the fans a different insight on it.
Come the season 2019/2020 – which was a turning point for me. The club had asked me to be involved in a media officer role with the reserves/U23 team. I had no idea what to expect, but I was still glad to be involved. Perhaps it has been the role where I’ve learnt the most. I was not only tasked with writing match reports, social media reporting and the occasional interview – but I also filmed a couple of matches and was really part of the staff: discussions on the bus about tactics, formations and specific roles were always present. And a very open and exciting conversation with Lee Cattermole, Haji Wright and Jerome Sinclair. Unfortunately the season was cut short due the COVID-19 crisis. I knew one thing for sure: I loved the football side of working for the club more than the media side.
I kept showing up at matches of the U19 team in the 2019/2020 season and analysed some games for the U19 staff, which I really loved. Analysing data to improve matches, I thought I was doing some basic stuff – but it helped the players and that made me rather happy. I never thought I would be a scout for the academy or first team, but at the beginning of this season I was asked to be a scout and coordinate other scouts as well. A real wtf moment for me, I’m actually scouting for an Eredivisie club. On top of that, I’m an analyst for the U14’s of VVV-Venlo.
Now this seems a bit arrogant to some, but I’m really proud of the roles I have had within the club and I would do a lot to grow more within the organisation and make it more sustainable to have a good operating scouting division.
So what’s difficult?
It’s all fun and games when things are going great with the club, but the results have been not too positive in the majority of the 2019/2020 and 2020/2021 season. We escaped relegation in the last season and we are on the brink of serious difficulties in this season. The club have never issued anything that would forbid me of talking about the club, but it’s really a strange thing.
I loved to have a proper discussion about players, formations, tactics and the way the club was run – but that has changed. Being more involved with (data) scouting and analytics, means that you look at the game differently and to talk with people who purely support the team without wanting or having the data, is a whole different spectrum. Discussions become different.
I’m still a fan and sometimes I’d like to push my own agenda supported by data, but who is it helping? No one. Sometimes it’s hard to make a distinction between analysing and doing something as a fan. Could I talk about my club on social media? I could. But would it be wise? I don’t think so. Perhaps if I were only to present data dashboards or something like that, but it feels strange to do that. In the end I just want my club to succeed and win.
Perhaps in the future it will change, I’m a scout/analyst first at the moment and that relationship should always benefit the club. Not myself.
I’ve been scouting a lot this year and when watching games, I’ve come across a very interesting phenomenon in both the academies and in senior football: inverted full-backs. Obviously, I knew what they were and how they acted in the elite of football, but I didn’t know it was that popular to implement it at other levels of football. And why not!
There are different systems a team can play and different formations, but in my experience, the inverted full-backs can be found in a formation that plays with a back four. It can be played with inverted wing-backs, but they have a slightly different role than the full-backs and that’s where my focus lies at the moment.
In a 4–3–3/4–2–3–1 or 4–3–2–1 the full-back often has an attacking role going forward. They provide the width that isn’t given in midfield and in attack — many full-backs make runs down the line and provide a cross to the incoming attackers and attacking midfielders. In this case study, I will look at inverted full-backs in the Dutch U18 and U21 leagues with professional academies and top amateur teams(without revealing which teams and players) and look at their systems.
The choice of inverted full-backs can be done to offer a support system when going forward when you have inverted wingers, but what I’ve seen in the games I’ve watched — is that the teams would play with wingers and inverted full-backs, which I found rather interesting to follow.
In the games I’ve watched, I could see a certain pattern. The two full-backs would go into the half-spaces when they were in possession of the ball. In the image below you can see that first would move into position, before assuming their position forward.
The full-backs (#2 and #5) move into the half-space and play closer to the central defensive duo, making their shape more compact together with the double pivot (#6 and #8).
The full-backs are positioning themselves in a way that they can provide passes to several attacking players and moving up the pitch themselves. Important is to stress that it all starts with a compact defensive shape, consisting of 6 players — often in a 4–2–3–1 formation, one of the most used formations in the games I’ve watched.
The compact defensive shape in the build-up.
What I saw a lot in that compact shape of 6 players, is that only the full-changed their position and the double pivot didn’t adapt to the situation. In possession, this was fine, as the attack was being constructed — but this could give problems in transition from attack to defence when losing the ball.
In the image below you can see how the inverted full-backs remained in the half-spaces and operated on the opponent’s half.
The two inverted full-backs play high up the pitch at the same time and this leaves questions on who will cover them in transition from attack to defence.
As you can see both the full-backs were higher on the pitch. In this case, this leaves space in both the half-spaces as the flanks on both sides. They need to be covered and in transition, it’s important that players get back. In the games I’ve seen, they reacted with two different options:
The double pivot was broken and each of the players would cover a side. In the image above, this means that both #6 and #8 would trail back and cover the tradition full-back position, but leaving space in the middle — which should be covered by the inverted full-backs.
The double pivot remains on their position, but the wing-attackers trail back to cover the original full-backs position. They would get a well-covered defence, but lacked the width in attack — the #10 and #9 could only get the ball through the middle and were easily defended.
The passing triangles in attack with an inverted full-back
When going forward, the inverted full-backs were part of a passing trial. In the image above you can see #2 and #5 as the inverted full-backs. They have two options when passing. The attacking midfielder (#10) or the wingers (#11 and #7). The #10 is an option what would bring the most success or most threat, as he acted in zone 14. He could distribute to the sole striker or give it to the wingers who would cut inside.
Passing to the wingers was interesting as well, but didn’t give a lot of threat in most of the games. The crosses into the box were quite okay, but only two players (#9 and #10) were able to attack the cross against 4 defenders.
Conclusion It was very cool to see that in the U18 and U21 leagues, the concept of an inverted full-back was implemented — but it caused a lot of questions for the transition. Who would cover the driving inverted full-backs? And what were the consequences of that? The two resolutions they sought in transition, still made them exposed to attacking threat of their opponents. That’s the next step for those teams to discover and explore
