League Cup Final Preview

*This article originally appeared in the online League Cup Final Preview Magazine. Please click the embedded link to see and/or download the magazine in full.

Team News

With Daniel Majstorovic ruled out for up to eight weeks, manager Neil Lennon may opt for the experience of Glenn Loovens over Thomas Rogne.  Georgios Samaras doesn’t get many starts for Celtic these days but has started in the last three Old Firm matches, meaning he will likely form a front two with Gary Hooper in attack.  Beram Kayal, Kris Commons and Scott Brown, who returns from suspension, will form the midfield along with either Ki Sung-Yeung or Joe Ledley.  It will be interesting to see whether Lennon decides to go with playmaker Ki, who can dictate the tempo, or whether he predicts a tough midfield battle and favours the more industrious Ledley.  Ledley may just edge it due to his brace against Inverness on Wednesday but either way Celtic should begin with their lopsided 4-4-2 which over the last month has evolved into more of a 4-2-2-2, but more on that below.

For Rangers, Steven Naismith is back from injury but may not be ready to start.  Against Kilmarnock on Sunday, Walter Smith lined-up Rangers in a 5-3-2/3-5-2 formation with Diouf just off Jelavic in attack, but has favoured 5-4-1 against better opposition.  Bougherra, Weir and Bartley will no doubt form the back three with Ricky Foster and Sasa Papac at wing-back.  Smith must then chose between the two formations.  Given Diouf’s tendency to drift away from his starting position, and the way Izaguirre exploited this when Celtic ran out 3-0 winners last month, Smith has a decision to make regarding how he fits the temperamental Senegalese forward into his line-up, if at all.

Celtic’s evolving 4-4-2

In that match, Celtic were able to play 4-4-2 without finding themselves overmanned in the centre of the pitch.  This was due to Scott Brown playing a more tucked-in right–sided midfield role, effectively giving them a central midfield three, with Commons wider and more advanced in a lopsided shape.

Their last three matches, however, have seen Brown slightly more advanced and Commons playing narrower.  This has made their formation resemble Villarreal’s 4-2-2-2, with two holding midfielders and two tucked-in wingers (although in Celtic’s case, one attacking midfielder and one tucked-in winger).

With the liberalisation of the offside law in 2005, which has seen the amount of offsides per match drop dramatically, high defensive lines are used less regularly meaning that games have become more stretched, leaving more space in the centre of the pitch.  Most teams have reacted to this by introducing ‘four band’ formations – for instance, 4-2-3-1, the predominant formation at last year’s World Cup, as opposed to 4-4-2 or 4-3-3 – splitting their midfield into two parts.  Neil Lennon’s 4-2-2-2 allows for this fourth band while retaining a 4-4-2 shape of sorts.  This means he can field two, as opposed to one, strikers against the three centre-backs of Rangers.

The 4-2-2-2 obviously lacks width in the midfield but as is now the trademark of Lennon’s Celtic, the full-backs habitually scurry up and down the wings, play as wingers for large parts of matches and sometimes even find themselves in the opposition penalty area.  For example, Celtic’s goal in their latest victory over Rangers involved a cross from Izaguirre that was finished, eventually, by Wilson.  Scott Brown’s goal came about in a similar manner when he equalised in the 2-2 draw at Ibrox last month.

With a few exceptions, Celtic’s team more or less picks itself.  What is less predictable is how Lennon will approach the match.  It will be interesting to see whether Celtic come firing out of the blocks or whether they’ll, knowing that Rangers will almost certainly get plenty men behind the ball and keep it tight early on, be patient enough to enjoy long spells of possession and try to work openings without forcing them.

One thing is for sure, Lennon is never afraid to change his system or his strategy early on when things aren’t going his way.  Against Hamilton two weeks ago he switched to a 4-3-3 midway through the first half and in the 2-2 draw with Rangers, he changed the position of several players with less than fifteen minutes played.

Key player – Scott Brown

One of the other key factors to the success of Celtic recently has been the revival of Scott Brown.  In January, Craig Fowler criticised the ex-Hibernian midfielder on The Terrace Scottish Football Podcast website for failing to sustain his form after his £4.5m transfer.  This can, at least partly, be explained by the majority of his time at Celtic Park being served as one half of a central midfield two.  Due to the stretching of the game mentioned earlier, midfielders can no longer play the box-to-box role as effectively.  This has caused most midifelders to adopt a more specialised role as either deep-lying or attacking.  It seems that his lack of form was as much down to the type of 4-4-2 employed by Celtic during most of his spell there as Brown’s inability to ‘specialise’ himself adequately.  Recently though, Lennon has tweaked his formation and allowed Brown to become more specialised.  He has now hit form as one of the attacking midfielders, knowing that the likes of Kayal provide an anchor in midfield that lets him get at opposition defences.

Rangers have more attacking options now

With a number of key players returning from injury, Walter Smith now has more attacking options at his disposal.  The five-man defence will line-up as usual but it is the midfield and attack where Rangers suddenly have competition for places.  In the attacking areas, Smith now has Jelavic, Diouf, Lafferty, Naismith, Weiss and Healy to choose from.

Nikica Jelavic will lead the line but then it would appear that Smith has four options regarding the set-up of his midfield.  Option one is of fielding two deep-lying central midfielders flanked by two wingers can be dismissed out-of-hand.  Smith attempted something similar in the 3-0 defeat at Celtic Park, albeit with Kyle Bartley as a defensive midfielder rather than centre-back, and found his side severely exposed down the wings.  He will no doubt avoid this given the threat of Izaguirre and Wilson from full-back.

The second option would be to again play four across the midfield but instead play a winger on one side and a more defensive-minded midfielder on the other.  For instance, Diouf on the left with Steven Whittaker tracking Izaguirre’s runs and providing protection and cover to Ricky Foster.  This would allow Rangers’ deep-lying central midfielders to match up man-for-man against Commons and Brown but would leave space for Kayal and Ki/Ledley.  In such a midfield four Diouf, if selected, would be the main source of support for Jelavic but has shown his inability to put in a disciplined defensive performance and his lack of tracking back would afford the central midfield two of Celtic the time and space to dictate.

Option three is a variant on option two and, therefore, falls foul of the same problems.  Considering this is a cup final, Rangers may ditch their ultra-defensive approach, knowing that gambling on penalties may be too risky, and be slightly more enterprising in their approach.  The formation would involve a deep-lying, three-man central midfield - most likely Davis, Edu and Whittaker – with Diouf or Naismith just off Jelavic but with the freedom to roam.  This option would allow the central midfield to help out their wing-backs in tracking Wilson and Izaguirre but in turn would leave gaps in the centre of the pitch for Commons and Brown to exploit.  A knock on effect of this is for one of the central defenders to step out, leaving space in-behind which could be dangerous.

Finally, there is the ultra-defensive approach preferred in the previous Old Firm and in most European matches this season that involves a bank of four relatively defensive midfielders in front of the back five, although one, usually the left-sided midfielder, pushes on more than the others.  This may very well be the set-up Smith opts for, at least in the early stages of the match, as it stifles the central areas that Celtic’s front four operate in while also providing scope for doubling up on their troublesome full-backs.  This would again allow Celtic’s central midfield two time and space but would make it much more difficult for them to work openings.  The strategy may then be to keep the score at 0-0, introduce the likes of Weiss and Naismith as the match progress and Celtic become tired, knowing that they are the type of player that can create a yard of space and hurt opposition defences.

Key player – Madjid Bougherra

 

A recent article by Jude Ellery on Defensive Minded noted that Chelsea’s signing of David Luiz marked the revival of the libero, an attack-minded defender, but under a different guise in modern times.  Whereas during the eighties and nineties the libero was a sweeper who would bring the ball out from defence and start off attacks, the more modern role is almost invariably a centre-back doing the same.   As well as a strong defensive presence, an attacking option is something Bougherra has offered during his time at Rangers, although less so this year due to the absence of Lee McCulloch who would usually sit in front of the Rangers defence and slot in seamlessly when required.

Bougherra could often be found playing one-twos around the halfway line and providing overlaps on the right wing.  There was recent evidence of this coming back into Bougherra’s game in Rangers’ match against Kilmarnock last week, and in a 5-4-1, when required, he may be able to revive his meandering runs more often, knowing that he has two centre-backs and ample cover from the midfield.

Conclusion

No matter how each team line up, the respective strategies, initially at least, will be for Rangers to keep it tight and for Celtic dominate possession.  Whether Lennon instructs his side to heap pressure on Rangers early on or else remain patient will be interesting to see, but whatever it is, we have seen in the past that he is not afraid to switch shape early on in matches if the initial tactics are not working.

Rangers will get plenty men behind the ball and defend for the opening stages of the match.  The main question will be whether this executed with a bank of four disciplined midfielders or else three such midfielders with one deployed in a more liberated role.  Smith then has options from the bench, something lacking in recent weeks, that can force openings and create opportunities when the game wears on and becomes stretched.

*Since writing this article it has come to light that Bartley and Lafferty will miss the match due to injury, in which case Rangers will be influenced by their second half performance against PSV and probably include Kyle Hutton as a defensive midfielder in a 4-5-1 formation.  Another option would be to reatin the 5-4-1 and move Saca Papac into the centre of defence.  This would mean Steven Whittaker taking up the left wing-back role and Hutton coming into midfield.  The injury to Lafferty means that Steven Naismith will almost certainly start the match.

Rangers 0 PSV 1 (0-1 on aggregate)

Rangers tumbled out of the Europa League along with the other British representatives with a performance that involved a contrasting approach to each half.  PSV were not great, they didn’t need to be, but they did what they had to do to progress.

Kyle Hutton and El Hadji Diouf were dropped from the first leg with Greg Wylde and Sasa Papac brought in as replacements.  This meant 5-4-1 as usual for Rangers, with Wylde the main source of providing transitions from defence to attack and Kyle Lafferty preferred as the lone striker.  Neil Alexander was again favoured ahead of Allan McGregor in goal.

PSV made one change to the previous meeting between the sides, replacing Stanislav Manolev with Abel Tamata, and lined up in exactly the same way in a 4-2-3-1.  The only thing of note about PSV’s approach that cannot be explained with reference to the first leg was that Ola Toivonen did not stick as high up the pitch and displayed more of a tendency to drop into midfield and receive the ball.

 

First half a first leg rerun

As well as assuming similar shapes to the 0-0 draw in Eindhoven, the first half took a remarkably similar pattern to the first leg.  Rangers got ten men behind the ball wherever possible and only pressed in their own half.  If the ball did not cross the halfway line, they were not interested in winning it back.

PSV were happy to hold on to the ball, mostly through Orlando Engelaar, move it into wide areas and wait for openings to appear.  We even had more outrageous shoot-on-site action from Balasz Dzsudzsak.

Both sides had opportunities from the left side early on.  Wylde, who caused problems for the nervous Tamata all night, showed terrific pace and sent a dangerous ball into the box that no one in blue could connect with.  Dzsudzsak wasted an opportunity from a similar position at the other end.

It was from an opening down the left that the only goal of the game arose from.  Erik Pieters sent a wonderful through ball from a very deep position and into the path of Dzsudzsak and he delivered a low cross into the six yard box that was finished by Jeremain Lens.  Even though it was a well worked goal, a few faults can be found with the Rangers defending.

Rangers’ passing in their own half then became rushed and inaccurate and they soon had their supporters berating them for holding such a deep defensive line and still refusing to press the ball outwith their own half, despite now requiring two goals to progress.  This led to a period where PSV were happy to knock the ball around their six most defensive players and the goalkeeper and Rangers allwoing them to do so – I haven’t seen the stats but I’m sure Andreas Isaksson completed more passes than Steven Davis is the first half.

When Rangers did get forward the closest they came to an opportunity to score were a series of set-pieces that were wasted by poor deliveries.

Change of formation, strategy and attitude in second half

At half time, Smith switched to a 4-4-1-1 and withdrew Davie Weir for Steven Naismith, who moved played just off Lafferty in attack and was free to roam from wing to wing.  Moreover, his position was such that Engelaar and Hutchinson’s time on the ball became much more limited.  The movement and pace of Naismith gave Rangers exactly the spark they had been craving but this was aided by a dramatic change in approach.   The Rangers midfield was not nearly as deep as it had been in the first half and Steven Davis was now looking to get on the ball and dictate play.  As well as this, Rangers were now pressing PSV high up the pitch and Madjid Bougherra was getting forward with increasing regularity.

The weak link in the PSV side was evidently right-back Tamata and Wylde exposed this by beating him on a number of occasions and whipping some quality deliveries into the box that, unfortunately, no Rangers player could capitalise on.

There ensued a sustained period of pressure from Rangers, their first over the two legs, in which they thought they had scored and were unlucky not to be awarded a penalty after the ball struck Hutchinson’s arm on the goal-line.  A Naismith header came crashing off the bar in the same passage of play and Maurice Edu came close minutes earlier.

Midway through the second half, Lafferty picked up an injury and was replaced by Diouf.  Even though it appeared to be a straight swap, Diouf was actually deployed as a false nine but seemed to overdo it, dropping deeper than the midfield on a number of occasions.  It was unfortunate that the change was forced upon Smith since it seemed to kill any chance his side had of getting back into the tie.

Bougherra wasted a free header from a corner while Rangers’ play became increasingly more frustrated as the game entered the closing stages.  Dzsudzsak hit the post late on in a half where PSV weren’t really involved yet managed to hold on to their lead and progress.

Conclusion

In the end, Walter Smith showed his opponents too much respect in the first half and insisted on keeping a deep defensive line, even after going a goal behind.  In his post-match interview Smith said “I’d have liked us to played better in the first half of the game…regardless of the formation or whatever way we were playing”, but surely he’d concede, privately at least, that the second half showed that they are capable of attacking against good sides and maybe should have adopted a more attacking approach from the off.

There were similar signs of an overly cautious approach in the second leg against Sporting Lisbon in the previous round and it seems that even though sitting deep with ten men behind the ball may be the correct approach against the likes of Manchester United and Valencia, a more attacking approach in the Europa League would not only have given their supports more entertaining, less frustrating football to watch, it may even have helped them progress further than they eventually did.

Loss of Kyle shows need for new formation

A few months ago, Hearts sat in a position that lead some to speculate whether or not they could mount a serious title challenge.  A run of eleven matches without defeat, including ten wins and eight clean sheets, saw them move well clear of Kilmarnock in fourth and placed them within touching distance of the Old Firm.

Towards the end of that fantastic run, Hearts lost striker Kevin Kyle to injury.  Even though not the most prolific – five of his seven SPL goals have come from the penalty spot – he was a vital part of the success of the 4-2-3-1 system that Jim Jefferies has employed for the majority of the current season.  Since then, Hearts have struggled to find an adequate replacement among their squad and the word coming out of Tynecastle now is that the Scotland international may miss the rest of the season.  This poses the question, has the time come for Jefferies to adopt a new formation?

For the opening ten matches of the current SPL campaign, Jefferies chose to line-up Hearts in an orthodox 4-4-2 but after some indifferent form, culminating in a 3-0 defeat at home to Kilmarnock, decided to ditch the formation in favour of something more modern.  For the subsequent match at Easter Road, Jefferies switched to a 4-2-3-1, the predominant formation at last year’s World Cup.

In that match, Kyle was deployed as the lone striker, with Stephen Elliott and David Templeton either side and Rudi Skacel the more advanced of a midfield three.  The shape included two holding midfielders, one to break up the opposition play - Adrian Mrowiec - and a ball player with fewer defensive responsibilities but who was still required to graft - Ian Black.  This base, combined with a strong defensive unit, gave the ‘3’ in the 4-2-3-1 the licence to support Kyle in attack.

Even though Jefferies likes his sides to play passing football where possible, he is pragmatic enough to know that the rigours of the SPL, not to mention the temperamental condition of some of the playing surfaces, makes this method undesirable at times.  Thus, Jefferies is not afraid to instruct his side to switch to a more direct style, knowing that Kyle possesses the ability to hold the ball up in advanced areas.

After the recent draw away to Aberdeen, Jefferies admitted that “Aberdeen adapted to the type of surface” and that “this was a day for Kevin Kyle”, which was his way of conceding that he would have liked the option of hitting long, direct passes towards a target man in order for him to hold the ball up and bring midfield runners into play.  He wins most of the aerial and physical battles he faces and, further, is able to occupy two centre backs in a way that negates the numerical disadvantage Hearts have in this area of the pitch.  This was the key to Jefferies’s system during the height of its success.

Though brought to the club under the pretence that he could potentially be the twenty-goal-a-season striker that Hearts have sorely lacked for several years, his main attribute has been to hold up the ball and bring the likes of Skacel, and Templeton into play.  A perfect example of this came in Hearts’ 2-0 victory at Easter Road on New Year’s Day, a match in which Kyle consistently pulled central defenders out of position, held the ball up effectively and created opportunities for his teammates.

Hearts have other options in these attacking midfield positions, not least Stephen Elliott who has spent a large portion of the season on the right wing, yet often drifts inside during matches to form a classic big-man-little-man partnership with Kyle in attack.  The best of Elliott has been from this position and the reason his form has dipped since Kyle’s absence is not so much that he has played as the lone striker, a role that doesn’t suit him, but more that he has not had Kyle alongside him to feed off.

It is not just Stephen Elliot that has failed to fill the space vacated by Kyle.  Midfielder David Obua was initially chosen, solely on the height he possesses, but was predictably out-muscled by Frazer Wright and Mohammed Sissoko against Kilmarnock at Rugby Park.  The following match against Rangers saw another midfielder, this time Ryan Stevenson, chosen.  Again height was a factor but Jefferies this time hoped that his bulky frame could help in replicating Kyle.  Even though Stevenson scored in this particular fixture, he struggled to get involved in the match and it wasn’t until Jefferies moved him back into the midfield of a 4-2-2-2 formation that he netted the winner.

Gary Glen and Callum Elliot are two others who have tried their luck in the position.  In terms of attributes, Callum Elliot is perhaps the most suited of all possible replacements but has failed to regain his early season form in his recent handful of appearances.

Injuries in other areas of the field, such as central midfield and full-back, have no doubt also contributed to the recent dip in form and it could also be argued that Hearts have become predicable in their strategy.  With Kyle missing, it is down to other key dangermen to score and create but teams have recently shown that doubling up on Templeton and man-marking Skacel out of the game makes the Jambos a far less potent attacking threat.

This point adds yet more weight to the argument that Jefferies should seek an alternative to his current system.  Even with all key players available, opposition managers soon begin to develop methods of countering the formations and strategies of in-form sides, especially given that it is possible for teams to face each other up to seven times a season.

A return to the standard British 4-4-2 is not desirable.  Not only was it unsuccessful when the current campaign was in its early stages, but also because the formation leaves a shortfall in midfield when lining-up against the likes of a 4-5-1, 4-3-3 or similar variant.  However, lacking an adequate replacement target man, Jefferies may now need to consider switching to a two-striker formation for the remainder of the season.

The narrow 4-2-2-2 that Jefferies switched to during the home win over Rangers earlier in the season is one option, as by removing the wingers it allows the team to play with two strikers but without leaving the side overmanned in the centre of the pitch.

Whatever Jefferies decides to do, he must come up with a way of compensating for the periodic absence of the injury-prone Kyle, not just for the current season but for seasons to come.