Season 2011-12 Fan Articles

'Table Football' football?

By Chris   Rudd  ::  23/08/2011   69 Comments (»Last) Putting aside all the Kenwright stuff for just a moment or two, Saturday's game has, I know, led to arguments up and down the land (and across the globe judging by this site) concerning the performance and the extent to which David Moyes's team selection dictated the level of that performance. From the "What's he supposed to do with no money?" believers to the "Defensive-minded shite" detractors, opinions have been many and varied and the arguments heated and desperate.

Now, I don't claim to be a tactical genius and Moyes is the manager and has more experience than any of us on here (unless Howard tunes in to ToffeeWeb) in running a professional football team, but even his greatest supporters must be starting to think he's just a little out of touch with what's going on at the better end of the Premier League and in football generally.

Watching a young Man United side on TV last night, you couldn't help noticing the fluidity of their movement, the interplay between the different units of their team and the lack of "table football" lines across the pitch. Every area of the team had depth to it, players weren't moving in rigid rows ? making them so much harder to pick up for defenders and so much easier to pick out with a pass, for team mates.

Rooney has become a master of the 'Barcelona-style' drifting between the lines, and orchestrates all around him but even relative rookies such as Cleverley, Wellbeck, Jones and Smalling looked comfortable and, dare I say it, 'happy' playing this fluid style.

Now, I'm not here to praise Ferguson, but in my opinion this staid rigidity in Moyes's teams is killing us. Making us terrible to watch and often ineffective against organised teams set up to stifle. Hence our recent struggles against Wolves, Stoke, Birmingham etc etc. And now QPR.

We can argue all day and all night, and we do, about the relative merits of our players, but results against the better teams last season would seem to suggest that we do have some decent senior players and some promising youngsters. Barkley's performance on Saturday was a joy to watch because he didn't look weighed down with tactics and was progressive throughout, always looking to move the ball forward and then find space. So many of our players look pedestrian because the only ball on is a sideways one because of those rigid lines.

Pace is an expensive commodity which we're sorely lacking but movement is something that any set of players can be coaxed into. Beckford gets a lot of stick on here, some of it justified, but he along with Fellaini and Baines find space and have constantly good movement. Playing a more fluid 4-1-3-2 or 4-2-3-1 formation would enable progression up the field as a group without the need for lightning pace and would stop our lone and/or supplementary striker getting isolated ? which presently happens throughout every game.

They say that doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome is the definition of madness. Moyes's version of 4-5-1 or 4-4-1-1 has surely had its day and it's time for a change. We've no money, neither the manager nor the chairman is going anywhere in the immediate future, as far as I can see, and we're probably stuck with the squad we have until Christmas at least. So, given that we can't change any of that, why not change our thinking.

A formation is really just a state of mind, so dismiss the dour... put a bit of fluidity and joy back into Everton's football starting on Wednesday night and you never know, we might just see a change in early season performances and results. Here's hoping...

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