Hence the need to have a very good defensive midfielder. 3-5-2 is unquestionably the most dynamic formation, and the most fluid. But it does rely heavily on players with the ability to play it and not many can.
Against 4-5-1 the perfect 3-5-2 would come up trumps. 3 defenders vs 1, as opposed to 4 vs 1. Comfortably allows one centre half to shuffle across and cover the wing back (especially if the DM is smart enough to drop off into defence), but also allows to the team to match the oppositions 5 man midfield whilst still giving them two forwards to worry about.
I'd argue that a suicide 3-4-3 with the total football style of defence is about the most fluid and dynamic formation possible. It's an insanely risky formation but it's hard to imagine a more fluid or dynamic formation than that. Of course, it's insanely reliant on player ability, I think most of the more unusual formations rely on player ability though, as well as team qualities like work ethic and such.
That said, 3-5-2 is more fluid and dynamic than most formations, so I don't have a huge issue with that part of your post.
I have a major issue with a standard 3-5-2 vs a 4-5-1.
Against 4-5-1 the perfect 3-5-2 would come up trumps.
This is incorrect.
Of course, it depends who and what you're playing. 3-5-2 against a league 1 or league 2 side playing a 4-5-1 has some advantages, against a good team parking the bus or a strong possession side, the results may vary.
3 defenders vs 1, as opposed to 4 vs 1.
That's not right at all.
Your 3-5-2 has 3 CBs, so the first part is correct.
The 4 v 1 comment isn't right. When playing a 4-5-1 against a back 4, it does depend on exactly how that 4-5-1 is set up, but most of the time the back 4 performs like a back 4 would against a 4-3-3 (even though there is a huge difference between 4-5-1 and 4-3-3)...
So a back 4 would have 2 v 1, one spare man and the full backs can concentrate on the opposition wide players.
Comfortably allows one centre half to shuffle across and cover the wing back (especially if the DM is smart enough to drop off into defence), but also allows to the team to match the oppositions 5 man midfield whilst still giving them two forwards to worry about.
Ok, so you have a DM (obviously), you have 1 CB covering
"the" wing back. Surely you'd have both wing backs attacking at once? So that back 3's position would be a little strange covering one wing back, sure you mentioned the DM can drop back (which is a beautiful thing about certain DMs that I just love), so in that scenario you might have a back 4 which could cover both wing backs if needed. In turn though, you would need one striker to drop into midfield to maintain 5v5 in there defensively. But offensively, you bring that DM to the midfield and push the striker forward to get your 5 v 5 in offence.
I'm even more stubborn than Guardiola when it comes to making sure your team has the numbers in midfield, so I do love a lot of things about the 3-5-2... But let's look at it in a couple of situations.
Firstly, Sunderland. I wanted us to change to a suicide 3 at the back with Sandro as the pivot that would drop back when we defended and Parker would have performed the DM role he does for us when we play a back 4. They had Bentner as the lone striker with Sessegnon playing behind him but were parking the bus.
I'm not trying to compare that to your proposed formation, I'm just trying to say that I'm not "anti 3 man defences".
Let's look at your 3-5-2 in that situation. We can forget the people we had available that day and things like that because you could play the world XI in any formation you want against 12 year old girls in the best possible formation and the world XI are going to win... So just from a tactical point of view: 3 CBs, 1 DM. 2 Wing backs. I don't know the rest of your team as far as types of players go, so I don't know if you have another DM or if you have really really offensive midfielders.
But your 3-5-2 offers only 2 wide players, wing backs. Most systems have 4 wide players, 2 on each side that can overlap and such... But the only width this team would have would be in 2 players with defensive responsibilities. (Against a team parking the bus, this isn't a huge problem, but they aren't as free as wingers in a front 3 are, or even wide players in a traditional midfield are, they have more cover than full backs
usually have though. )
So the opposition's strategy is simple. The 4-5-1 parking the bus can pack the midfield and be more narrow than usual because there is less of a wide threat than most systems offer.
The fact that a second striker plays in your system means that long balls and such would be more effective, but losing 2 wide players in order to add a striker to the forward centre of the pitch is not the tactical advantage that your post seems to imply.
Defensively, you have 3 CBs and a DM all sitting against a team parking the bus, sure, it means they are less likely to score than when you only have 3 players sitting, but I feel it is slight overkill against Bentner and Sessegnon when Sessegnon was deployed fairly defensively. A DM could cover him with a CB covering Bentner and a man free, that'd be more than enough for me.
Yes, they had wide players, but again, the 3-5-2 doesn't defend width
that well... The exchange of 2 wide players for an extra CB and a Striker doesn't really need a huge explanation when it comes to this... Even compared to a 4-4-2, a 3-5-2 would be trading both full backs for a CB and a midfielder, so again, it doesn't have an edge defending traditional width.
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Now on to a strong possession side.
The obvious strong possession sides play 4-3-3 more than 4-5-1, so it's hard to find a good example...
I think I'm going to use Arsenal as an example because although Walcott is very much a forward player that plays in a front 3, it's a team most of us know well and the difference between a 4-5-1 and Arsenal's 4-3-3 isn't an insanely huge difference... The only other example would be our 4-5-1 but that 4-5-1 was utterly retarded as it featured 3 holding midfielders. I can't think of a better possession side to play 4-5-1 than us though, even Swansea play a 4-3-3.
Anyway, we're not totally focused on players anyway. But I just wanted you to have an idea how that 4-5-1 would set out and what the team played like.
3-5-2 vs that type of 4-5-1 has advantages and disadvantages. Against either Arsenal or Spurs, packing the middle of the pitch and having 3 CBs to take care of midfielders or wingers running in behind is an advantage, the centre length of the pitch (all the way from our CBs to their CBs, but not the parts with wide players) has a bunch of bodies which means passing through the middle should be harder. 3 vs 3 in the middle, means you aren't going to get overrun in midfield, you even have 2 strikers to press with.
The biggest defensive issue is going to be against overlapping wide players. Whether it's Arsenal or Spurs, both teams use wingers with a full back backing them up. We're ignoring player abilities, so we don't need to focus on "Walcott is brick" or "Bale would drift inside anyway so it wouldn't matter", even if you have average top 4 standard wingers and full backs to deal with, this is a problem.
Offensively, against a 4-5-1, the 4-5-1's wide midfielders would do some defensive work, so wing backs have got to overcome a right/left midfielder and a full back. Again, the exchange of an extra wide player per side in order to have more players in the middle is a real hindrance to wide build up play.
For the record, having more players to cross the ball to if a wing back does manage to get into a good position and cross the ball is great, but not only is that at the expense of width, but it might not actually happen. It is likely that the opposite winger would be on the back post, so it may just be trading a winger on the back post for another striker or another midfielder in the box.
(I'm not sure if that part is totally clear, it'd be handy to have pictures to help explain things sometimes.
)
But on to another clear advantage. 2 Strikers against a possession team that is packing the middle of the pitch means that long balls will have more potential than they would with just a lone striker.
but also allows to the team to match the oppositions 5 man midfield whilst still giving them two forwards to worry about.
This part is true, but at the same time I can't quite express the value of that second striker. The trade off is that they will have 2 less wide players to worry about.
I think that's the best way I can describe it. Would you rather defend against 2 wingers and 2 full backs or 1 extra striker and another CB (in addition to 2 CBs and a DM)?
Yes, they would have to deal with a second striker, but they would have 2 wide midfielders to deal with 2 wing backs and 2 full backs to cover the 2 CBs against 2 strikers. The 4-5-1 would defend against a 3-5-2 like they would against a 4-4-2 as far as the full backs go.
The second striker is valuable yes, but the 2 wide players you're trading him for were also valuable.
Just for the sake of being fair, set pieces have one extra CB and that striker instead of 2 wingers (wingers are
usually not great in the air, but are useful defending counterattacks, so you can make of that what you will.)
