Xavi, Pirlo and Cabaye are hardly massive units. We need to get out of this mindset of wanting big powerful athletes.
None of them are really defensive mids either. Spain have Busquets/Alonso, Italy have De Rossi (for me, the best defensive mid in the World), and France have Sissoko/Matuidi.
I was jut going to post the same Xavi,Pirlo and Cabaye are not what i would call defensive mid fielders, I would call them creative mid fielders who go forward a lot nor did I mention anything about big powerful athletes.
The deepest midfielder doesn't have to be big and strong if his role is to drop deep, get the ball and distribute it. Can have someone else in the middle whose role is to close players down and apply pressure further up the pitch to either win the ball or force them to rush bad passes. There's no rule that the deepest midfielder is defensive and the more advanced is the most technical, it's just typically seen that way. Look at us last season. For many games Huddlestone dropped deep to distribute the ball while Livermore harrassed opponents a bit further up the pitch. Other games Livermore dropped deeper to let Huddlestone push up a bit. I do wonder how Huddlestone and Wilshere would do as a central pairing, would love to see that in a friendly - or Hudd/Wilshere/Henderson as a trio. Henderson didn't really impress me this World Cup though.
Alonso is very similar to Pirlo, Xavi and Cabaye. Sissoko is box to box. You don't need to be a big massive unit to be holding midfielder. Wilshere could easily do a job as a holding midfielder.
