Not a Footium Blog

Big man, little man, cardboard box…

Now, I am not saying that Footium should drop everything and add heights to players so we can authentically have a “big man, little man” combination…but they should!

The Line Ups

Our Line Up

By this part of the season, we were really struggling with rotation. Trying to train players, trying to get through formations and trying not to get relegated! There was a lot going on.

Average Squad Rating: 40.5

Opponent’s Line Up

Our opponents went for 5-4-1DM. It kind of looks a bit like a spaceship? Or is that just me…

Average Squad Rating: 40

So this actually gave us an Average Squad Rating 0.5 higher than our opponents!

Real Life Context

It’s 4-4-2! What’s not to love. Some of the most iconic teams of all time have used 4-4-2, especially the classic big man/little man combinations. Jermain Defoe & Peter Crouch, Michael Owen & Emile Heskey and the mighty Kevin Phillips & Niall Quinn.

At one point, it was the biggest formation in world football, but times change and it’s not as common as it used to be.

From Sean Dyches’ Burnley, to Claudio Ranieri’s Leicester, there have still been some iconic 4-4-2’s in recent memory.

Strengths:

• Counter Attacks. This formations is great at soaking up pressure, then breaking quickly and going up the other end. This was the most iconic element of the title winning Leicester team, and helped them to victory.
• Defensive Strength. As there are two banks of 4 in front of the goalkeeper, this allows 8 outfield players to remain back and make themselves really hard to break down.
• Strike Partnership. Defending against a striker partnership is really difficult, so having one in the game is a challenge less teams are used to in this era.

Weaknesses:

• Possession. If you’re a team that wants a lot of the ball, 4-4-2 might not be the formation for you!
• Outnumbered in the middle. With only two midfielders, in an era where you will be coming up against teams playing 3 or more in the middle very often, your midfielders may find they are trying to win the ball back a lot.

The Match

So, this match fell apart pretty quickly. Our opponent’s scored in the 3rd and 4th minute, leaving us 2-0 down before long at all!

I switched up the mentality to try and get back into it, but nothing seemed to work!

It ended 3-0 in the end. Stats below:

So the game was more close on the stats than the result! We still had decent competitiveness around the pitch, but clearly didn’t have our shooting boots on!

Onto the next one.

See you all on the pitch!