Time to ditch 4-2-3-1

Sometimes logic truly goes out of the window, and at Chelsea Football Club that seems to be a pretty regular thing. For years now we have been playing a 4-3-3 formation and it has worked for us very well indeed even though for a lot of the time we have not had the ideal players for that formation. It has been a long time since we had proper wingers that will run at defenses and try to beat their man and until last season we have lacked that creative playmaker, that number 10, who will make things happen behind the 3 forward players.

If you take a look at what we have been playing with recently and analyse it we have been making things harder than they need to be, yes we have had injuries and players away with the African Cup but it does not need to be such a struggle, this has been our team of late:

What you have here is a number of players playing out of position in a formation they are not comfortable with. Ivanovic is a fantastic player but for me he is a much better player as a center back, yes as a full back he has scored goals but positionally he gets caught out far too often Newcastle's second goal at the weekend being a prime example. In this formation you have 2 sitting midfielders who will break up the play and get the ball moving forward again but playing with Lampard and Ramires you have 2 players who are box to box players and will instinctively get forward. Again it has been a pattern of last few games, both players high up the pitch, we lose the ball and the opposition break without any cover from the midfield. Then we have Bertrand playing as a winger, if you are asking him to do a defensive job only as was needed in Munich then fine, but to be using him as a solely attacking job just does not work, he is a left back.

If we had all of our players available to us then the only way to make this formation work for us would be to put out this team:

Here you have 2 proper full backs, 2 proper sitting midfielders who can get the ball forward to the attacking players and 2 proper wide players. What we are not allowing for is the ability to rotate the squad and give players a rest. The bottom line is to not keep trying to put players where they are not comfortable. Play the system that suits the players, not try and force players to play a system that they are not suited to.

Going back to the 4-3-3 now, we may have a small squad this season but playing the 4-3-3 gives us the best opportunity to use our squad to it's fullest. Our strongest team in a 4-3-3 would look something like this:

Again all over the pitch there is balance, players playing in their natural positions to enable them to fully know their roles and deal with any situation that comes up. I truly believe if we were to play with this formation we would again be a truly formidable side and would put teams under serious pressure. But more importantly we would see the nervousness in the side disappear as everyone would be comfortable within their roles in the team.

Also in playing this formation we could play 2 completely separate teams with full balance and strength. Not that we would necessarily have to play this team as it is but it give the chance for rotation of players with some players being very comfortable in a number of positions:

I have no idea why there is such a determination to continue with the 4-2-3-1 as it just is not working for us and if we continue to persist we will not see an upturn in results, any team sees us as a soft touch now and can easily expose us and put us under serious pressure. The time to change is now, switch to the 4-3-3 and focus on making top 4, that is an absolute must for us.