The Twe12th Man Website

Well done Gareth for going with King and Alves up front, with Tuncay in his natural position of central midfield, in my opinion there was only one weakness in the formation, Andrew Taylors lack of pace at left back, which Downing amongst others has to cover for, King leads the line superbly, holding the ball up, to set up our attacks, got to be first on the team sheet along with Tuncay in centre mid, for the remainder of the campaign, this is a team that will create chances and cause real problems for any team.

Though after reading the match reports and analysis in the press, they will have us believe that this team are weak at defending, just because we have some good attacking players in it, we played 4,4,2, not, 4,3,1,2, as some of the press had us believe.

In reality, 4,4,2, can be a strong defensive unit as well as a potent attacking force, so they must be targeting the four midfield players, for their lack of defensive qualities, i.e, not being able to cover for Tuncay when he bursts forwards to support his strikers, I say they should not be in the team if they can`t defend, Downing can, does it for Boro and England, Bates is a defender, so they must be targeting Alialdiere, I have enough faith in him to hold an attacker up till we can regroup, yes you can commit too many players forward at any one time, but of the four midfielders and two strikers we had on show against Hull, I would back any three to cover any attacking forays by the other three, If it is necessary to be defensive with this type of line up, just tell them not to attack too often, even on the break they could be devastating, so don`t listen to the so called experts who tell you this is a gung ho formation, coach
these lads into an efficient unit, at Bolton you said you were going to play attacking players but not go gung ho, I was at Bolton, I wished you had of done, because with no king to lead the line you had no one up front, as Alves always plays on the left, so you had effectively six in midfield and four at the back, who just got in each others way, so do us a favour Gareth, play the 4,4,2, for the remaining games, you might have to restrain them sometimes if they get too gung ho, but at least they will know what they are doing, incidentally when Fulham played Andy Johnson and Bobby Zamora, were they be accused of being gung ho ?

Mick Johnstone.