Saturday, September 29, 2007

Should van Basten stick with 4-3-3?

I've visit ESPNSoccernet recently and read an article from Ernst Bouwes. Well this guy , is not a big fan of Holland using the 4-3-3 formation. I couldn't agree more with him after watching Hollands performance in both qualifying games - against Bulgaria and Albania - althought they won. It's true that 4-3-3 has served Holland well in the past - especially in the Cruyff era , but it seems that the system didn't suit our current players. Most of the players play with different system with their clubs week in week out - 4-4-2 being the most common. The main problem lies with our fowards. To excel in a 4-3-3 formation, we need genuine wingers on both flanks. But the only natural winger that van Basten has in his disposal now is Arjen Robben. Ryan Babel, Robin van Persie, and Dirk Kuyt are not natural wingers, the former being the most obvious. All of them thrives in a two striker system. The main victim in this system would be Ruud van Nistelrooy. Since Germany last year, he suffer from lack of supply, especially from his fellow wingers. The trends continue in the two qualifying games - eventhought he score two goals. To add the confusion, van Basten plays a left footer on the right, and a right on the left. Consequently each of the wingers has to turn around whenever he reaches the goal-line and they're forced to cut inside to shoot, which is believed to be very dangerous. But, that is not the case as we seen so far and this has limited the number of crosses for the central srtiker - mainly Ruud. Even the midfield has no clue how to provide passes to the fowards, since most of them usually plays in a different system. While, the under 21 side has prosper under the two striker system, winning the European championship twice in succession under coach Foppe de Haan. Now even the 'kids' are not use to 4-3-3 system, which would not suit them in the future if van Basten or any other manager in the future stick with 4-3-3. Hopefully van Basten would look deep on the situation and ponder whether he should defend the Dutch football heritage - the 4-3-3 system, or change with time.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

im not so into soccer but u got one helluva brain man..ur opinion is thorough,yup.keep blogging aa..maybe one day 'somebody' might criticize you better aa..haha

mega_kong said...

haha...
thanks

Anonymous said...

The Reds(Kuyt & Babel) leads da way...we'll never walk alone...

mega_kong said...

Sorry rusty, but i don;t think Kuyt is good enough to lead the line

Anonymous said...

van Basten should reconsidered Kuyt to be in Holland X1 team 4 his well-performance recently..