I do love Long so it's win/win - but there were at least 2 occasions on Saturday where I feel like Austin would have scored and Long didn't. His air shot, and the header just after Tadic's silky run.
Oh there's no doubt about who's the better finisher. Austin is the best finisher in our squad by a country mile and just has that natural instinct. I, like you was immensely excited when we signed him and if it was upto me I'd build the team around him in a 4-2-3-1. As it looks though, unsure how he fits in the high press diamond system. I love Shane too and he's one of my favourite players but clinical he ain't! Just think we'll need his pace on Friday night as I see us camped in our own half for long periods.
But Shane creates something from nothing....no point in being a finisher if someone else doesn't do the leg work. I would always play Shane at the moment.
Not expected to get anything from this game. First home game at Old Trafford with the likes of Pogba making his debut, so the crowd will be up for it. My team would be: Forster, Cedric, Fonte, Van Dijk, Targett, Romeu, Hojbjerg, Davis, Redmond, Tadic, Long. Bench: Mccarthy, Pied, Ward-Prowse, Clasie, Austin, Yoshida, Rodriguez.
You don't think we might use different formations for home and away? Playing 2 strikers at OT is suicidal. I guess the key question is... Are Puel's balls that big?
Possible, and I would be very happy about that, but there hasn't been any sign of a different approach in friendlies etc (that I am aware of). We couldn't even change whilst drawing at home v 10 man Watford. How do you take a striker out and not totally rewrite everything?
The squad are already very familiar with 4-2-3-1, so less need to practice that. Also, haven't the club stated that they want the first team to use the same tactics as the academy? This is what im clinging to anyway.
We're playing diamond, I'm already over it. To be honest it might work better if someone just explains to Romeu that he can't go on suicide runs or do any other stupid stuff, there is literally no one to cover him.
The diamond does concern me. Ive said it a thousand times we need 2 CDM's. 4-2-3-1 would be my preference but what do I know.
The diamond is flexible formation. Nothing wrong with setting out in a diamond, so long as it tends to drop back into and 4-5-1 off the ball.
But in terms of players who fit into specific positions ie AM, ST, DM, we are playing with only romeu.
A diamond formation normally consists of a CDM, CM, CM, CAM. So having 3 CM's, with Hojbjerg being able to play a deeper role and get further forward too should work well. Means we can have 3 CM's who can get forward when we attack, and 2 to sit in front of the back four when we are defending.
Well we know it worked under Poch. But we also know it had limitations and there was rarely a plan B. Koeman introduced us to the concept that a formation is only a starting point at the kick off and that the shape changed with the play. So I'm not too worried about the diamond as the norm. There will be variations depending on the opposition. Puel has already articulated what went wrong on Saturday - better than any comments on here - so I have confidence that we will get better.
It's easy Fran. Look at the photo below. That is a 3-4-1 (me being the 1 taking the photo) If we moved Tom across to the top of the table rather than the left, moved Dave to where I was sat, brought Etc back into the photo and swapped you and Helen's positions, we'd then be playing a diamond. Either way that photo looks like we're playing with two diamonds in the rough. Make sense now?
