4-2-3-1: The System The Manager Inherited.
The system we predominantly play is not a kick in the head from this one; using inside forwards to supplement the forward line and with the support of an attacking midfielder. We have wing backs who get up the pitch and often find themselves where the wingers would normally be; they, of course, are either inside or just outside the box, as auxiliary strikers.
This formation can be tweaked in terms of the individual roles the players fulfil. Brown, for example, is a ball winning midfielder whereas his midfield partner – usually Callum – is a box-to-box player, or at least he was under Rodgers.
Now he plays a more withdrawn role as a deep lying playmaker, which he’s effective at but which blunts his effectiveness somewhat.
The problem we’ve had with the system is that the inside forwards end up outside the box and the lone striker is crowded out in a penalty area where there’s usually every man behind the ball. Our slow and steady style of play – which is designed to draw defenders towards you – actually now has the opposite effect as opposition managers know that’s what we’re doing and only have to insist that their team shows tactical discipline and keeps its shape.
The slow football also allows teams time to regroup, so whenever we have the ball you can watch them all charging back to form their defensive line as we pass the thing from side to side … and even when we get a break and we’re not facing a fully packed penalty area more often than not our wide men are exchanging passes with our fullbacks and trying to put it into the feet of the sole striker, who is usually being man marked by at least two defenders.
When you play a sole striker that’s what will happen.
It is to Eddie’s credit that he still manages to score a lot of goals, and of course the system is designed to get you a lot of goals from the wide men and the supporting midfielder, who last season was Ryan Christie and finished our second top goal scorer as a result.
When it works, it does work well … and at Celtic Park and on the wide pitch at Hampden, where it’s less easy to just put your back to the wall and defend the whole game, we can still pull part defences with it.
The problem, as we all know, has been away from home on little tight pitches against uber-defensive sides who try to hit us on the break.
The 4-2-3-1 tends to be used with a high press, and even when it isn’t it still tends to leave too many players high up the pitch making any team who uses it vulnerable to counter attacking play. We’ve seen that happen time and time again.
The system can be varied to combat this, but it means playing deeper and as the system was set up to create chances and goals from the wide men that would be counter-productive; how many teams actually do come and have a proper go at Celtic, home or away?
They’d need to for us to get any joy out of playing a counter-attacking game of our own.
The 4-2-3-1 has served us well, as far as it goes.
But too many teams have it figured out and too many of them just allow us to have possession knowing the final ball into the box is easily defended.
When our wide men run at people and pull the defenders out of position, that’s when we tend to get the best out of it … but disciplined teams remain hard to break down.