From today's Times
In December, Antonio Conte did something audacious — and significant. He sanctioned the sale, to Chinese club Shanghai SIPG, of Oscar: a key member of Chelsea’s title-winning team of 2014-15, a Brazil regular, and a player, at 25 years old, of peak-career age.
He did so despite having an extremely small number of first-team players for a title-contending side, and despite the fact that Oscar was an important part of a large Lusophone contingent in the Chelsea dressing room, also including David Luiz, Willian, Diego Costa and the reserve goalkeeper Eduardo. But Conte had seen which way football’s tactical sands were shifting and come to a realisation: the traditional No 10 was dying.
For a period beginning with the emergence of 4-2-3-1 as football’s most popular formation in around 2008, the position of No 10, or central attacking midfielder, was arguably the most important attacking position in the game, the main creative fulcrum in the football’s default formation, a brief usually filled by a team’s most gifted playmaker.
Last season though, particularly in the Premier League, something interesting happened. Genuine No 10s playing in their natural position became a rarity. Of the foremost exponents of the position in the English top flight, Oscar was sold, Kevin de Bruyne was often deployed in a deeper position as a central midfielder, and Philippe Coutinho, Henrikh Mkhitaryan, Gylfi Sigurdsson and Christian Eriksen generally played in wider roles. Mesut Özil and Dele Alli both finished the season as inside forwards. The overall picture was clear: this was a season of adapt-or-die for traditional No 10s.
The USA head coach Bruce Arena went as far as declaring: “There really aren’t No 10s anymore. There’s no such thing in the modern game today because the game is much faster, all players kind of attack. Guys that play in the midfield have responsibilities on both sides of the ball.”
Why did No 10s fall out of favour? In part because a certain type of player — an advanced playmaker without defensive responsibilities, a sort of luxury-item attacker — became incompatible with a game increasingly focused around pressing in advanced areas of the pitch. “Think about the passes you have to make to get a player in a No 10 role in a position where he can play the genius pass,” Jürgen Klopp, a notable No 10-sceptic, has said. “Counter-pressing lets you win back the ball nearer to the goal. It’s only one pass away from a really good opportunity. No playmaker in the world can be as good as a good counter-pressing situation.”
The 3-4-2-1 formation effectively sacrifices the No 10 from a crowded area of the pitch for a third centre back. The other two centre backs can split into wider positions allowing the full backs to play more advanced as wing backs thus freeing up the wide midfielders to play in more central areas where they can inflict the most damage upon the oppositionThe 3-4-2-1 formation effectively sacrifices the No 10 from a crowded area of the pitch for a third centre back. The other two centre backs can split into wider positions allowing the full backs to play more advanced as wing backs thus freeing up the wide midfielders to play in more central areas where they can inflict the most damage upon the opposition
But also for another reason. Let’s be frank: wingers haven’t really been wingers for a long time now. In the last ten years, traditional, touchline-hugging, crossing wingers have become devalued currency. The prototypical modern wide player generally operates on the opposite flank and is much more comfortable cutting inside towards the dangerous central areas of the pitch than taking a full back on out wide.
Here’s one “problem” with 4-2-3-1 and No 10s. If you’ve got a wide man cutting inside from the right, and a wide man cutting inside from the left, and a No 10 operating centrally, that’s a lot of players occupying the same space. This is where 3-4-2-1 and inside forwards come in.
3-4-2-1 is the hot new formation du jour in the Premier League. Chelsea have used it pretty much exclusively since switching to a back three last September. Arsenal have employed it since their move to a back three in April. At Tottenham Hotspur, Mauricio Pochettino has used it in combination with 4-2-3-1, but the signing of Davinson Sánchez suggests he’s looking to a future with the 3-4-2-1 system. It is also the preferred formation this season of Everton and Stoke City, and may well be West Ham’s too for the foreseeable future after their improved displays against Huddersfield and West Bromwich Albion.
By comparison to 4-2-3-1, 3-4-2-1 effectively sacrifices a somewhat redundant trequartista for a centre back. This allows for greater security and flexibility at the back, where you now have enough centre backs for one to split out wide to cover an attack down the channels. It also means that the full backs are pushed up to become wing-backs, which suits the modern wide defenders that most teams have at their disposal, who are primarily attacking assets rather than defensive players.
It’s further forward that things get really interesting though. In the three-quarter, or attacking midfield positions between the defensive midfielders and the striker, three players become two. Instead of having a right “winger”, a No 10 and a left “winger”, you have two players stationed somewhere between the central position that would be occupied by a No 10 and the wide position occupied by a winger — in what might be termed, in an echo of the terminology of the first half of the 20th century, the inside-forward positions.
Because of the popularity of 3-4-2-1, inside forward is now the position being filled by some of the most talented and creative attacking midfielders in the Premier League and beyond. Eden Hazard and Pedro play there for Chelsea, Alli and Eriksen play there for Tottenham, Özil and Alexis Sánchez for Arsenal. Hoffenheim have used Nadiem Amiri and Andrej Kramaric in the inside-forward positions, and Atalanta have played Jasmin Kurtic and Josip Ilicic there. Roberto Martinez has played 3-4-2-1 with Kevin De Bruyne and Dries Mertens in the inside-forward roles for Belgium, and Serbia have employed the formation consistently with Dusan Tadic and Filip Kostic as the inside forwards. Both sides are unbeaten in World Cup qualifying.
The inside forward position, essentially, allows modern wide players to do what they are good at. Rather than getting chalk on their boots and having to discharge the defensive duties that the wide position demands, they have the freedom to operate in more central positions where they can more easily shoot at goal or play a killer pass without having to make a long dribble infield. (It is perhaps no coincidence that the two leading goalscorers from outside the box over the past three Premier League seasons, Coutinho and Eriksen, have spent some of that period playing at inside forward.) They can flit between the lines of defensive structure while the wing backs provide the width and cover the flanks.
The graphic on the left displays Hazard’s touch map playing on the left in a 4-2-3-1 against Liverpool in the match before Conte switched to three at the back. The graphic on the right shows Hazard’s touch map playing as an inside forward in a 3-4-2-1 against Hull City in the match after Conte switched to a back three. Playing as an inside forward, Hazard is able to affect the game in more central areas
The graphic on the left displays Hazard’s touch map playing on the left in a 4-2-3-1 against Liverpool in the match before Conte switched to three at the back. The graphic on the right shows Hazard’s touch map playing as an inside forward in a 3-4-2-1 against Hull City in the match after Conte switched to a back three. Playing as an inside forward, Hazard is able to affect the game in more central areas
A look at Eden Hazard’s stats demonstrates this. In the period between the start of 2015-16 and the game against Arsenal in September last season, when he played largely out wide in a 4-2-3-1, Hazard averaged 1.9 open-play crosses per game, 1.8 shots, 0.20 goals and 0.10 assists. Since the switch to 3-4-2-1, Hazard’s crosses have almost halved, to 1.1 per game, but his shots have increased to 2.1 per game, and his production has shot up, averaging 0.50 goals and 0.18 assists in that period.
Interestingly, the presence of inside forwards is the main point of difference between Conte’s Chelsea and Conte’s Italy, who generally played a 3-5-2. That team was mightily effective and well-coached, but had little between-the-lines creativity (arguably because Conte didn’t have the necessary players at his disposal) and sometimes struggled to break down organised defences. At Euro 2016, Italy scored six goals in five games, but of those, one was a penalty; one came indirectly from a free-kick; three were scored after 87 minutes, against defences that were tired or overcommitted in search of an equaliser; and the remaining one came from a long ball by Leonardo Bonucci.
One of the authors of the trend for 3-4-2-1 (first popularised on these shores by Brendan Rodgers in his final full season at Liverpool, who famously told the media that he had conceived the idea of playing Coutinho and Adam Lallana as inside forwards in a 3am brainwave induced by tea and toast) was the former Swansea City coach Paulo Sousa, who used the system at Basle (including in one match against Rodgers’ Liverpool) and subsequently at Fiorentina, with Ilicic and Borja Valero as the inside forwards. Another key member of Sousa’s Fiorentina 3-4-2-1 was — drum roll — Marcos Alonso at left wing back, whose recruitment by Conte doesn’t look like such an accident in that context.
Like any formation, 3-4-2-1 has its weaknesses. If your wing backs get pinned back, it leaves you with very little width. As Everton have discovered, doing without a genuine winger — especially if your inside forwards aren’t blessed with pace — can neuter your threat on the counter. But 3-4-2-1 is undoubtedly here to stay, and with it a new, old position which allows adaptable No 10s and itinerant wide men to strut their stuff.
