Not a Footium Blog

This is it! The very last formation, and the very last match of this journey!

It seems only fitting that the last formation we used was the formation we faced far more than any other during this journey!

Across 29 matches, we faced 5-2-3 or 5-2-3A on 14 occasions! You lot need to start mixing it up a little bit.

Given that we’ve managed to try 29 formations, you guys could at least try 2 or 3!

However, we did only beat 5-2-3 twice, so maybe there’s something in it?

The Line Ups

Our Line Up

As you can tell, we were really struggling with rotation at this point. I think fatigue got to use in more ways than one at this point, with me wanting the experiment to be over so we could try and keep Marrouck Villa in the league!

Average Squad Rating: 40.5 (at the time of playing)

Opponent’s Line Up

This is the formation of someone who wasn’t messing about. Well rested players, prioritising the vital positions (wing backs and wingers) and also playing, you guessed it, 5-2-3.

Average Squad Rating: 38.4 (at the time of playing).

This left us with an advantage of 2.1 in the rating departments, but you can see just how knackered our players were!

Real Life Context

Well. We finally did it. We finally used 5-2-3. CLASSIC 5-2-3.

There have been a few examples of teams using it throughout the years, with some slight variances.

Barcelona used it to great effect in 2008/2009 under Pep Guardiola, and funnily enough, loads of blog posts online have suggested Man Utd need to use it! There is basically a ‘draw your own 5-2-3’ for every Man Utd manager since David Moyes…

I particularly like this legitimate suggestion below of a back 5 incorporating Rojo, Bailly and Phil Jones!

Strengths:

• Defensive solidity. As we’ve already indicated, this is an extremely strong defensive unit.
• Fluidity. The wingbacks are extremely important, as are the pivots, meaning this formation can transition and be versatile.
• Support for the striker. With either two wingers, or two additional forwards, the striker doesn’t get isolated and always has support.

Weaknesses:

• Vulnerable to counter attacks. If 5-2-3 loses possession with the wingbacks attacking, there can be huge gaps between the lines that the opponent can exploit.
• Requires specialist players. As the wingbacks are such a specialist role, if you lack quality in this area you can really struggle.

The Match

I would like to say we went out in style, but we got absolutely battered.

We were 4-0 down by the 78th minute, only getting 1 back in the 80th before conceding another, ultimately losing the game 5-1!

With a tired team, against an opponent who were up for it, this seemed right.

Stats are below!

The stats really speak for themselves. They had 26 shots, for goodness sake. 1 goal was probably overly kind for us!

And that’s it…

So. That’s it! After nearly 2 full seasons, 29 formations, and losing a lot of matches, we finally got through EVERY Footium formation. Thank you so much to everyone who has followed this journey. We hope you enjoyed it!

We will do a full, long-form recap blog post soon, diving into the data and seeing what we can learn about how formations work and any potential counter picks.

But for now…see you all on the pitch!