Magical Formations and Constant Tactical Changes

Discussion in 'Borussia Dortmund' started by eaglespark, Jan 17, 2017.

  1. naopon

    naopon Member+

    Jan 2, 2007
    California
    Club:
    Kawasaki Frontale
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    To be fair, I don't think Tuchel is really that wild with his formations. He has 2 basic setups, the 4-3-3 and the 3-4-3. Now, I think the latter with 4 fullbacks on the field is pretty unsightly, but they have played enough to at least be fully familiar with their roles and interplay.

    I wonder if Tuchel's tactics are weird more because he feels a need to grind out results (as poorly as that is going) rather than just putting out a squad to play good football and develop over the course of the season. Leaving Weigl and Raphaël as your sole central midfielders with a lead-footed Durm high up in the wing doesn't really send the message that you want to play efficiently in possession, and when the team falls behind Tuchel adds more directness in the form of Schürrle and Castro.
     
  2. bvbSlash

    bvbSlash Member+

    Jan 7, 2014
    Berlin
    Club:
    Borussia Dortmund
    Nat'l Team:
    Argentina
    There are three major reasons why TT deploys the players and tactics that he does: 1) awful transfer market activity. We have a ton of utterly crap players and no quality in central midfield apart from Weigl. The development of the squad has been very poor in general. We bought 8 players and only 2 have been good while Bartra has only recently shown some improvement. 2) there's no development amongst the majority of players. Götze, Mor, Ginter, Passlack are extremely talented players. Yet guys like Castro, Schmelzer, Durm, LP and Schürrle are picked ahead of them. 3) TT won't let the Mislintat do his job. I get that he failed with Bellarabi and Torres but cut the guy some slack. TT should stay away from the market and focus on being a tactician.

    If Mislintat were to build up the squad without interference, TT would have much better players to work with.
     
    BVBFNM repped this.
  3. eaglespark

    eaglespark Member+

    Apr 9, 2015
    Club:
    Crystal Palace FC
    I disagree with this. I think Tuchel plays the tactics he does for three different reasons.

    1. He decided last year he wanted to play 4-1-4-1 or 3-4-3. He targeted players that would allow him to play this system, but when the board bought differently he forced players to play out of position.
    2. He has an affinity with certain types of players and wants to play them.

    I will expand on point 1 first. This is all just my opinions, but backed up by what was leaked. Tuchel wanted the following players: Toprak, Bartra, Bellerabi, Schurrle, Rode, Castro and Oliver Torres. He got a lot of these players, but Oliver Torres was perhaps the most important player he did not get. I haven't seen much of Oliver Torres, just his initial early games a few years back and Youtube compilations. Torres' best position is one of the two attacking midfielders in a 4-1-4-1 (or a 4-3-3). From every clip I have seen of him he has played in the left central midfield role. Instead for better or worse the board chose Gotze. This completley ruined Tuchel's plans for the team, because Gotze is a 10 and has to play behind the striker to get the best out of him. Tuchel however, has been incredibly stubborn. He has forced Gotze/Kagawa/Raphael to play out of position in this formation despite it not working and the players struggling. Instead of playing them in their best positions he is forcing them to fit into his formation, which I believe is poor management. I can't blame Kagawa/Gotze/Raphael for doing badly when they are played out of position.

    The second formation he planned on playing was the 3-4-3 and that is where Rode comes in. The 4 midfielders in the 3-4-3 have to be physical monsters and cover a lot of ground. Tuchel thought Rode was the man for this role. He has since lostfaith in Rode, but in theory Rode is the sort of midfielder needed to make a 3-4-3 work. Great energy is required.

    So the team did not get a Gundogan replacement, because Tuchel did not want one. Some people on this board said that Gotze was the Gundogan replacement. Slash you and me both said Gotze couldn't play there and it would fail. We didn't think Tuchel was going to do it, but we were both correct and wrong on this point. We were right that Gotze could not play there, but wrong in assuming that Gotze was not Tuchel's replacement for Gundogan.

    2. Tuchel clearly tends to favour a certain type of play. He likes German, hard working, fairly experienced players that are easy to manage. He loves the sort of player whose best level is Leverkusen; the player that can just about play for a top 4 team getting knocked out in the group stages or making the Europa League.

    Players like Schmelzer, Castro, Toprak, Schurrle, Bellerabi, Piszczek (though he was better before injuries), Rode and Durm. Half of those players have played for Leverkusen and that's their limit. They are all at least in their mid 20s and don't have the potential to go any higher.

    Tuchel does not seem to have the skills needed to manage true superstars like Reus, Auba and Gotze. I would say he has fallen out with all 3. So in his team selection he picks his favourites over players that should play.

    This is just my opinion and somethings can be backed up and I could be completely wrong. However, it's why I am losing faith in Tuchel.
     

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