Mourinho's preferred formation

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Tomo said:
Think the Winks-Lo Celso combo really works.
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I'm not sure.

Today was amazing, but once the buzz wears off, I think we'll have to admit that we got away with one today. Winks runs his absolute bollocks off, but I don't think he has anything near what it takes to play in a 2. Looked better in the second half, but they were down to 10.

Great to see him bringing the ball out, but I just don't think he's big enough for that role.
 
Cranston said:
I'm not sure.

Today was amazing, but once the buzz wears off, I think we'll have to admit that we got away with one today. Winks runs his absolute bollocks off, but I don't think he has anything near what it takes to play in a 2. Looked better in the second half, but they were down to 10.

Great to see him bringing the ball out, but I just don't think he's big enough for that role.
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Winksy and Lo Celso are ideal players for a 25 man Tottenham squad. I'm not sure Winksy is someone we can have in there week in, week out but I did think he was out MOTM today. Tough on a couple but Winks as backup/ rotation DM I have absolutely no issues with, in fact I think he's a great little option and we are lucky to have a acaemdy trained player like him we can rely on instead of just having him for the required numbers.

Lo Celso, you can see why he was called a ruby in Argentina. Busy but elegant with it what a buy!
 
He has to make the decision soon whether to fuck around longer with Lucas up top or deploy Son more there instead. Things got better today as we started the second half with Son on top.
 
Luvf said:
He has to make the decision soon whether to fuck around longer with Lucas up top or deploy Son more there instead. Things got better today as we started the second half with Son on top.
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Short term issue, when Kane is back Lucas get's benched, if Bergwijn, Dele, Son, Ndombele and Lucas can chip in with goals in the interim it's no big problem. In a perverse way not having bought a second striker allows Mourinho to rotate all his AM's for a few weeks ... every cloud has a sliver lining if you look hard enough.
 
BangkokSpud said:
Short term issue, when Kane is back Lucas get's benched, if Bergwijn, Dele, Son, Ndombele and Lucas can chip in with goals in the interim it's no big problem. In a perverse way not having bought a second striker allows Mourinho to rotate all his AM's for a few weeks ... every cloud has a sliver lining if you look hard enough.
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Dont even have to look hard at all for me. It is unfortunately too rbight and clear. I have a towel dedicted to wipe waters off my eyes theseday when I watch Spurs football lol. When is Kane coming back. How short is short?
 
reachingforthestars said:
Any educated guesses about our set up going forward?

The man quite stubbornly set us up in a 5-2-3 in the last 2 games despite the early signs against Burnley, and the formation change at half time.

The allegedly prefered formation by Mourinho is 4-2-3-1, which also looked to work in the early days. Since then we've been figured out, the "new manager bounce" wore off and the rebirth of Dele Alli has become an urban myth.

I would prefer a 4-3-3 as I feel it would complement our current squad in the best manner. Wouldn't suit Dele in particular, but he would have to adapt or be a super sub. No more 5atb for me please. The extra defender doesn't seem to up the quality of our defending.
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All of his best teams played 4-3-3 with a brute up front and goal scoring wide forwards. If we can give him the tools for that formation I think he will do well for us. Those wide players are hard to come by though. We have Son who is perfect but finding another will be tough. I rate Lucas but he isn’t that type of player, more of a traditional winger

Perhaps most important is the DM though, his successful teams all had amazing players there, Makelele, Matic etc
 
Dembele-Wanyama was so good but everything since has looked weak. I'm wondering if we should bung in Tanganga, alongside GLC in a Modric role. He'd be following the likes of Ledley and Dier as young centre backs playing defensive midfield.
 
VoiceOfThePoshSeats said:
Thread to speculate on our end game.

For me, our midfield is completely fucked for Joses preferred 4231 system. We dont have 1 good DM never mind 2.

Harry winks - Not good enough. Cant play DM too weak to play CM
Sissoko - Cant play DM as not enought passing range - cant play box to box as doesnt score goals
GLC - can only play AMC, we have alli
Dier - Past it
Wanyama - crocked
Ndombele - crap defensively, no good in a two, needs a 3 man midfield

The only chance weve got is a 3 man midfield, but then we still need a top DM.

..............Son......Kane......Moura
........Ndombele..DM...GLC


Even then that midfield looks terrible defensively.

I think were up shit creek. We need two midfielders with the style of Kroos/Modric/Alonso/Khedira

tottenham-mourinho-4-2-3-1.png


headache-III.jpg
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your comments are spot on, maybe try rodon and tanganga at the back, dier alongside PEH in the middle with ndombele or le celso as the box to box.
 
El Magnifico said:
My 2 cents:

Mourinho is manager who has a clear formation and style of play in mind. While he may compromise in the short term, he will keep working towards transforming his squad into what he wants. Thus, Mourinho is more suited to big clubs where he can acquire the players he needs/wants. I think Mourinho is good in identifying the needs of his team, but has questionable judgment on transfer targets and their valuations.

Mourinho is very good coaching the defensive and organizational side but less so on the offensive side. He can make average defenders look solid, but his teams attack depends heavily on the talent and creativity of the players at his disposal.

His base formation (>70% of matches) is a modified 4-2-3-1 (LWF/RWF on one side with RM/LM on the other, and an advanced CM instead of a true #10 or trequartista), while his backup formation is 4-3-3. Key difference is that he swaps a box2box midfielder in exchange for one of the four attacking players. Essentially 4-2-3-1 if he expects to dominate the game and 4-3-3 when he wants to pack the midfield and rely more on counter attacking. The most he has come close to having his ideal squad was at real madrid.

In terms of specific roles and players:

GK- beyond shot stopping ability, ability to control the box against crosses and kick accurate long ball. Cech was probably his best fit. Lloris is ok but at 34, he is probably needing replacement soon.

CBs - Physically and aerially dominant, both offensively and defensively. Needs at least one of them to have great pace to recover when playing a highline and one has the ability to bring the ball out of the defence. Mourinho has had a lot of great CB pairings (Ramos+Pepe/Varane, Lucio+Samuel, Terry+Carvalho). Unfortunately, the current options fall short and its probably one of his targets for the summer. Prime Toby would have been a good fit.

RB/LB - solid defensively but able to get forward and provide width for the attack. Should have good height for set pieces. Zanetti is prime example. Reguilon is a good fit (though a bit light on the physical side) but think Madrid will likely buy him back. Aurier and Doherty are good on paper but neither has been convincing. Aurier would be a good fit if he could improve his delivery and stop having brain farts. Doherty might deliver if he could keep himself in the lineup long enough to get in form.

DM+CM (dual pivot) - Apart from their defensive duties in shielding the defence, he requires one of them to be a metronome i.e. playmaker who can dictate the pace of the game, and one of them must be able to join the attack/get into the box. So it could be a DLP+ B2B or a pure DM+ playmaker CM. At madrid, Alonso was the DLP while Khedira was B2B. Currently Hojbjerg is the DM and Winks the CM. Hojbjerg is a good fit but Winks is not good enough for his role both defensively and offensively. Lo Celso doesnt have the range and vision but may be a better option than Winks

*B2B (2nd CM for the 4-3-3) - high work rate, physical CM, capable of man-marking a star player. It was lassana diara at Madrid. Sissoko fits the role almost perfectly

AM - Mourinho himself describes his ideal player as not a #8 and not a #10 but a #8.5. Essentiallly a CM with great creativity in the final 3rd (able to provide the defence splitting pass). Sneijder is probably the best he has had, while the current De Bruyne would also fit the bill. Ndombele and Lo Celso are the current choices, with the former being ahead.

RM/LM - Expected to be more of a midfielder/winger (like in a 4-4-2) than a forward i.e. more assists than goals, and helps with creativity in the midfield. Di Maria is probably the best example. Bergwin seems to top the list currently but he is not really the right fit. Lo Celso doesnt have the pace and is more suited centrally but might be the short term fix.

LWF/RWF - Expected to be more of a second striker that gets a lot of goals. CR is the archetype, but Son is a very good fit.

CF - physical, comfortable playing his back to goal, great hold-up play and clinical. I think Kane and Ibrahimovic are the best he has had. He can have no complaints (no coach can)
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B2B
Sissoko is a poor fit compared to others Mourinho has had in the past . While he has some strength , his poor technical ability costs the ability of a team to retain any possession,
link to forward play and stop the flow of wave of wave of attack after Spurs sit back.
A ponderous make do solution.
 
GLC played DM with PSG ONLY because they had Matuidi/Rabiot who were 2 wonderfull Box to Box and Verratti was the regular DM.
He like the DM/CM like Rabiot or Sergej Milinković-Savić who can do everything.
 
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