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what has happened to the transfer section?

But its two years out of date. AVB has moved on. Those tactics failed at chelsea.

He not gonna move Bale back out to the wing just because people think he has a hard on for a 433.


No, he'd move Bale to a left forward position because he has all the attributes required to play it.
 
I looked at buying that to read on holiday but then read thy it was upto Chelsea so wasn't very "current" which makes sense as its a set point in time

I guess we shall see what happens formation wise

It covers a good 10 years of his career, and is very much about the evolution of his philosophy, rather than a catalogue of events per se.

Because he's such a private person who doesn't give in depth/exclusive interviews (though will instead stay and answer every question in a press conference, which is apparently unusual), I don't think there will be anything comparable for quite some time. This was written by someone who knew him from an early age in Portugual IIRC.
 
But its two years out of date. AVB has moved on. Those tactics failed at chelsea.

He not gonna move Bale back out to the wing just because people think he has a hard on for a 433.

So what are your sources that "AVB has moved on". Do you really think he's abandoned 4-3-3 forever just because it didn't work out for him at Chelsea?

Seems to me much more likely that he's adjusting his formation and style of play to the players available to him. I don't think it seems all that far fetched that he's moving us in a direction of more possession based football, but doing so gradually. The players we're signing are consistently players that are good on the ball, regardless of position.

Of course we can't know for sure what his vision for the club is, only time will show. I don't think he's locked in thinking that only 4-3-3 will be the way forward, but I also think it's ridiculous to think that AVB has moved on from 4-3-3 and the tactical approach he had 2 years ago.

And who scores our goals then.
AVB repeatedly in his press conferences refers to Bale as a striker now.

So you can't think of any wide forwards around that score goals regularly?

Isn't it time people stopped categorizing Bale as a player only capable of playing one position successfully? He's been very good for us both as a winger and in the number 10 role, pushing up towards a forward/striking role at times. He's been utilized successfully on the right for Wales in addition to that.

Again, knowing what visions AVB has for the future is impossible to know, but it can be fun to speculate. Suggesting that there's only one possible position for Bale going into the future just seems wrong though.
 
So what are your sources that "AVB has moved on". Do you really think he's abandoned 4-3-3 forever just because it didn't work out for him at Chelsea?

Seems to me much more likely that he's adjusting his formation and style of play to the players available to him. I don't think it seems all that far fetched that he's moving us in a direction of more possession based football, but doing so gradually. The players we're signing are consistently players that are good on the ball, regardless of position.

Of course we can't know for sure what his vision for the club is, only time will show. I don't think he's locked in thinking that only 4-3-3 will be the way forward, but I also think it's ridiculous to think that AVB has moved on from 4-3-3 and the tactical approach he had 2 years ago.

I think he has moved on from having a strict ideological tactical way of setting up his teams and is now a pragmatist. He'll play a 442 now if it suits his teams but prior to his Chelsea he wouldn't have done that.

So you can't think of any wide forwards around that score goals regularly?

Isn't it time people stopped categorizing Bale as a player only capable of playing one position successfully? He's been very good for us both as a winger and in the number 10 role, pushing up towards a forward/striking role at times. He's been utilized successfully on the right for Wales in addition to that.

Again, knowing what visions AVB has for the future is impossible to know, but it can be fun to speculate. Suggesting that there's only one possible position for Bale going into the future just seems wrong though.

Of course Bale can play anywhere. But moving him from the centre would be like Moving Messi away from the centre. Of course he can play wide but he is much more dangerous in the middle.
 
So Parker-Dembele-Holtby can't work? Why did we buy him then? Why did we buy Sigurdsson? Dempsey?
 
Because we lack the creative midfielder. It's kind of integral.


i think had we started the season with Holtby we may have seen him play that role (if it's true it was his favoured position at Schalke) but the 433 was certainly not the best formation available to us at the end of the summer, imv
 
So Parker-Dembele-Holtby can't work? Why did we buy him then? Why did we buy Sigurdsson? Dempsey?


Dempsey would work as an inside Forward, and is our third striker. Sig could play LF or RF or one of the central three.

Holtby might work, but he wasn't here for pre-season and it would be silly to try and change our formation in the middle of the season.
 
I think he has moved on from having a strict ideological tactical way of setting up his teams and is now a pragmatist. He'll play a 442 now if it suits his teams but prior to his Chelsea he wouldn't have done that.

Both Porto and Chelsea were teams that played 4-3-3 before he came there as far as I remember. I don't see him as having a strict ideological tactical way of setting up his teams in the past. Nor do I think that he's gone through some massive change in approach since his Chelsea days.

Even if you're right that he's now a pragmatist and that he wasn't one before that doesn't mean that he doesn't have a long term plan where he envisions some changes in tactics, style, formation etc.

Of course Bale can play anywhere. But moving him from the centre would be like Moving Messi away from the centre. Of course he can play wide but he is much more dangerous in the middle.

I remember reading very similar comments about moving Bale from the left to the centre in the first place.

Where he will be most effective for the team in the future is not something I think it's possible to predict at the moment. Just like I don't think you can accurately predict that Bale would stop scoring just because he was used as a wide forward in a 4-3-3 for example.

Why aren't we playing 433 now?

Because we don't have the players suitable to playing that formation? After years with a manager preferring a 4-4-x formation... Or just because the manager thinks that a different formation will be more effective for us at the moment? That doesn't really say much about his long term plans...

Also worth noting that we played what looked to me very much like a 4-3-3 in the away game against Basel.
 
i think had we started the season with Holtby we may have seen him play that role (if it's true it was his favoured position at Schalke) but the 433 was certainly not the best formation available to us at the end of the summer, imv


Pretty much in agreement. It will be interesting to see if AVB thinks we still need that creative mid after watching Holtby, or if he thinks more work is needed elsewhere (LB or Striker).
 
So, we knew were were planning on going to 433, but we stuck with the 4231 system and signed three players to fit that system despite knowing they'd become redundant in a year's time. Yeah, that makes sense. Not to mention our 23yr old superstar world beating second striker no longer fits the 433 bill and neither does our flying right winger.
 
So, we knew were were planning on going to 433, but we stuck with the 4231 system and signed three players to fit that system despite knowing they'd become redundant in a year's time. Yeah, that makes sense. Not to mention our 23yr old superstar world beating second striker no longer fits the 433 bill and neither does our flying right winger.

which 3 players did we sign that don't fit the 433 and why doesn't Bale suit a wide forward role?
 
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So, we knew were were planning on going to 433, but we stuck with the 4231 system and signed three players to fit that system despite knowing they'd become redundant in a year's time. Yeah, that makes sense. Not to mention our 23yr old superstar world beating second striker no longer fits the 433 bill.


Huh?

None of this makes any sense. None of the players we've signed become redundant with a move to 4-3-3.


Moving Bale inside makes even more sense with a move to 4-3-3, because the top three are able to switch and rotate. He's played left and now centrally for us, and right for Wales.

But i'm starting to realise you're not actually here to debate this at all..
 
How on earth could you get 15m for those three? You'd be lucky to get half of that.

Hudd is English, still youngish, good delivery - a mid-table outfit would snap him up quickly, imv - +-6-7m

Dempsey brings with him the massive American market (just ask some of the US posters how many of our games are being shown in the US this season compared to last) - possibly one of the main reasons we signed him, along with the UA deal, etc. - +/-4-5m

Parker can still offer a tremendous lot to a bottom end outfit both in terms of experience, as well as leadership - could well be the difference to a newly promoted side in terms of survival or direct return - as well as the best 3m they'd spend that season
 
So, we knew were were planning on going to 433, but we stuck with the 4231 system and signed three players to fit that system despite knowing they'd become redundant in a year's time. Yeah, that makes sense. Not to mention our 23yr old superstar world beating second striker no longer fits the 433 bill and neither does our flying right winger.

Like I said, from my point of view we were essentially playing a 4-3-3 against Basel. Dempsey, Sig, Dembele and Holtby all started.

Once again these claims about Bale, that he doesn't fit a formation or system or position or role. Bale really isn't a particularly limited player, he can flourish in a number of positions, a number of roles and in a number of systems.

The difference between a 4-3-3 and a 4-2-3-1 isn't that big actually.
 
Hudd is English, still youngish, good delivery - a mid-table outfit would snap him up quickly, imv - +-6-7m

Dempsey brings with him the massive American market (just ask some of the US posters how many of our games are being shown in the US this season compared to last) - possibly one of the main reasons we signed him, along with the UA deal, etc. - +/-4-5m

Parker can still offer a tremendous lot to a bottom end outfit both in terms of experience, as well as leadership - could well be the difference to a newly promoted side in terms of survival or direct return - as well as the best 3m they'd spend that season

Hudd would need to prove that he is over his injury problems and get a run of games under his belt before he could anywhere close to that, neither of which is going to happen with us. I think that he best we could hope for at the moment is £2 or 3m with extra based on appearances but given his fitness problems, I think a loan deal is far more likely.

I agree that Dempsey is probably worth around £4 or 5m.

Parker is worth £1m or possibly £2m.
 
I think what formation we play next season will very much depend on what personnel we end up with at the (very) end of the transfer window.

What fudges me off is that everything will be left till last minute again. The new signings probably won't have a pre-season, well probably start the season with no defence/midfield/strikers (delete as appropriate) and have to forfeit the first few matches due to the way Levy does things. What annoys me is that we could have started the season with Dembele and Sandro in midfield, Dempsey supporting upfront and Ade helping Defoe upfront, instead we struggled with Livermore and no options upfront.

Were what one point behind Arsenal? We could have got at least 5 more points from our first 3 matches v Saudi Sportswashing Machine, Norwich, WBA with earlier transfer business. We would probably have got Moutinho sorted if we hadn't left it to the last day. If we miss out on CL by a few points I hope it makes Levy wake up and smell the coffee!
 
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