Season Review: Tactics

For today's Season Review article, we'll look at the tactics of the 2008-09 season. Now, I'm not one to say that I know better than Arsene Wenger when in comes to tactics, but sometimes it was clear he got them just plain wrong, while other times, he was spot on. Specifically, this review will focus on our formations and team selections of the course of the year.

Perhaps one of the most odd tactical choices of the season came in the very first game against West Brom. Diaby had been injured, and either Denilson or Cesc was out, so Eboue was played at Defensive Midfield. And to be honest it looked like a stroke of genius. He had a great game, looked solid, and it left myself and many others thinking he may be the answer to the DM problem. But then against Fulham when he was played there again he utterly failed, and put in a performance bad enough never to be played there again. Shame really.

We started this past season much the same as we had finished the one before, tactics-wise. Still playing through the centre, working it round the edge of the penalty area, and still having fairly good effect. Our 4-4-2 was of course a given, and it looked certain to stay that way when we went top of the league after beating Blackburn. However when November approached it all fell apart. Injuries came to the fore, and our defensive weaknesses made any good attacking threat we had irrelevant.

The end of the first phase of our season was surely the 3-0 defeat to Man City. It was at this point that we hit rock bottom, and in an interview later in the season, Le Boss would admit this was a turning point, the point where they went home and looked long and hard at the squad to figure out what was wrong. They settled on our defense as the weak spot, and went about strengthening that.

Over the next few months we clearly worked long and hard on our defense, and our tactics became slightly more negative. We were back to the old days of winning 1-0, and this was the product of both more reserved attacking, shorter passes, a less-direct style through the centre, and the fullbacks staying back more than ever. No longer were they encouraged to constantly bomb forward on the wing, but only to do so as occasion required. The effect was to make our back four a back four again rather than a back two. And the result was our conceding less goals.

However our defensive problems now sorted meant we now had the opposite problem: we couldn't score any goals. Arshavin was brought in on deadline day in January, but before he was fit to play we recorded four 0-0 draws in a row. Our defense was great, but now try as me might, we couldn't score. And in addition to this, or perhaps the cause of this, our passing style had become sterile. We weren't playing with a flowing style, but rather the kind of passing style one puts on at the end of the game to close out the match. A kind of keep-ball that is frankly boring and frustrating to watch.

But then with the return of Eduardo in the F.A. Cup, and the subsequent debut of Arshavin in the league, our flowing football suddenly and miraculously returned. And to top it all off, our defense remained solid. Results turned around remarkably, and it was perhaps capped off with that excellent win over Blackburn in the league, 4-0. By this time, our tactics had changed from a 4-4-2, to more like a 4-2-3-1. This was to provide more defensive stability, and it was working. Combined with our now excellent attacks, the formation worked perfectly.

But then when injuries hit against Villareal and Wigan, and our backline was decimated, all the defensive formations in the world couldn't help us. We could still score goals, but our problem was once again our defense. And that is how it remained for the rest of the season. We scored goals without a problem (with the exception of the frustrating 4-1 loss to Chelsea), but except for the 0-0 draw with Man Utd in the league, our defense was once again weak. Perhaps only our now-defensive tactics saved us from conceding boatloads in the final few weeks.

The defensive tactics were the same, and the flowing attacking style had remained good, but what killed our defense in the final few weeks of the season was the injuries to our defense. All the major players who had improved so much defensively over the winter months were lost to injury, and our backup players, while good, were not good enough to maintain a defensive standard worthy of a big four club. However, the overreaction to the last few weeks from many a gooner has surprised me. Let me make it clear: our defense is fine, when fit. If anything needs to happen in the transfer window it is perhaps the signing of some good reserve defenders, adequate ones who can keep up our level of defense we should have become accustomed to.

So there we are, a tactical view of the season. We started out the year in a 4-4-2 which was weak in defense, and we ended it in a much more defensive 4-3-2-1 which maintained the ability to attack. It could well be how we line up next season, and if our players are fit and ready, we have seen enough evidence to prove that the tactics will work. Thanks for reading, and don't forget to check out our Season Review Main Page to see what's coming up and what has passed during our continued Season Review week on Fab 4 Arsenal.

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