View From The Sphere

Would a 5-3-2 formation work for Arsenal?

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Our season started of well this year. Our defence received so much praise and was considered one of the meanest and most consistent in the Premier League. Not anymore though. We’ve conceded 15 in our last seven games and as a result Arsene Wenger is considering ditching his trusted 4-3-2-1 formation in an attempt to tighten up Arsenal’s porous defence by switching to a 5-3-2 system.

It is believed Wenger planned on implementing the idea for our Champions League clash against Schalke the other week after our defensive troubles during the 2-1 defeat against Manchester United and other certain games.

Wenger reportedly held a training-ground meeting to discuss the idea with his coaching staff and it is understood the change of formation is very much in the forefront of the Frenchman’s thoughts as we continue to struggle defensively.

But would a 5-3-2 work for Arsenal?

Well, I’ll attempt to answer this as I break down the key aspects of the said formation.

A 5-3-2 has five defenders, usually three central and two that operate as wing-backs. The latter positions would obviously be filled by Bacary Sagna and Kieran Gibbs respectively when both are fit.

Within the three centre-backs, the one in the middle usually acts as a sweeper – Laurent Koscielny, Per Mertesacker and Thomas Vermaelen would fill these roles.

The first problem for me with this is we have all our best defenders on the pitch at the same time, which leaves us very little to choose from should any of them pick up injuries.

Moving onto the midfield, which will consist of three centre midfielders, all of which will play very close together, cancelling out any options of exploiting the flanks – this power comes from the two wing-backs, which would turn that 5-3-2 when defending into a 3-5-2 when in attack mode – though the man in the middle of midfield could be dropped deeper too act as an anchor man or ball winner to help the back three when needed. Or he can be pushed forward as an advanced playmaker with two ball winners behind him in a triangle pattern.

The two men up top will have to play very close together, and this system works best with one striker pushed higher up than the other to act as target man, which in our case would be Olivier Giroud, or in some cases Lukas Podolski, with the second man acting as a support striker, feeding the top man or running off the shoulder of a defender. In addition, he can also be deployed deeper and play the #10 role, attacking from deep. Theo Walcott, Podolski, Gervinho and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain would be the ideal candidates for the role.

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huge Arsenal fan, love the team and all that comes with it.follower of all kinds of sports, football being my first love, yet to attend my first arsenal game but i am planning too, some time in the not to distant future. i enjoy writing as well, that's how i ended up here, never looked back....

9 comments

  • hottspring says:

    let’s have a balance putting more bodies behind makes your opponent concentrate on attacking U. by constantly attacking them we reduce their attacking creativity let wenger choose the formation. in my case I prefer 4-4-2 ,451 and 433

  • Junior says:

    I see the formation more as a 3-5-2…. Walcott wouldn’t take on the RWB role meaning he moves to a more central striking role. Gibbs, Sagna and Jenkinson are strong both offensively and defensively. A midfield three is kept!! Only question is where does Gervinho possible fit in. It’s worth a go I suppose! One thing I do agree is all 3 CB’s on the field doesn’t sound too healthy should one get injured

  • topemagnus says:

    I have assess this formation on a chalk board and realized that we will look more dangerous attacking with the 2 strikers and it will help conserve the players energy. It is more of 3-5-2 than 5-3-2

  • Charlie says:

    I’ve written about this a few times so this time i’ll summarise. Arsenal have NO natural wingers and a player in TV5 who is perfectly suited to the sweeper role. If you were fitting the Arsenal squad into a formation that allows everyone to play in their best and favoured position that formation would very clearly be 5-3-2 or 3-5-2. A manager must match his squad to his formation, that’s key, so in this situation I think the formation must be changed.

  • Charlie says:

    Just to add one more thing if Arsenal did change they’d need another CB. Best option would be Sakho because he’s a big strong unit (something Arsenal don’t have) and can cover for the LWB position where Arsenal lack depth. Problem being that PSG are probably paying him >100k per week now which puts him out of reach.

  • Charlie says:

    Regarding the man marking you play with a target man and a runner. If the opposition mark the runner (Theo or Gervinho) they’ll get turned and left for dead. The target man (Giroud or Podolski) needs to be able to hold off their marker and lay the ball off or beat their marker in the air.

  • mark says:

    our defense was great the first few games. dunno what happened. diaby made a difference wiht his mobility. i think its more about discipline than formation. i wouldn’t like to see a 5-3-2 formation as its overly defensive. sagna is useless as an attacking winger anyway. right now we don’t have good wingers but it will change in one or two seasons with Campbel, Ryo, Gnabry.

  • barry says:

    a 5-3-2 or 3-5-2 will defitely work. who says its a formation of the past. juventus won the league unbeaten last season playing this formation and they still use it now. inter have started using it and check out the results. i think it is worth a go. we will creat many more chances with this formation

  • Allen anpes says:

    You know Wenger is right for picking up a defensive mode and i pray it works by the grace of GOD, the formation which i really want them to use is the 4-5-1 formation so that it will ease Gervinho,Cazorla&Walcott form of play whom i suggest walcott takes the middle central role,Gervinho the right central role then Cazorla the left central role thereas arteta for the right wing,then chamberlain for the left wing.For now i think they need to concentrate on defense and setpieces.In my suggestion on team plan,they should try as much possible to gain possesion of the ball and use the opportunity to strike the ball well & also try as much as possible to score alot of goals as possible in the 1st half,then in the 2nd half they should focus on defending the opponents from crossing half of their area and they should try alot of setpieces from outside box it really helps alot.

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