When I first took in a Langwith College football match on a windswept and brisk 22 Acres on the morning of the 27th of October 2013, I did so with a heavy heart. Their opposition on that day was the Wentworth Postgrads, a decent mid-table outfit (think West Ham or West Brom) unglamorous but generally dependable and solid- yet even they were expected to hit a Langwith side who hadn’t won a competitive match in nearly two years for a cricket score.
The men in yellow, to their credit, were up for the fight. In the first half, their pressing was incessant and commendable, and they were unfortunate to go behind just before the break- that goal coming from a header from a set piece, nothing to do with their tactical set-up.
In the second half- they fell apart, and five goals were smashed into their net with aplomb by a rampant Wentworth. It is easy to take the layman’s approach, say that Langwith’s ‘heads dropped’ (that old cliché) and move on. That, though, completely overlooks the fact that Langwith were comfortably the better side in the first half, and lambs to the slaughter in the second. Sure, a goal on the stroke of half time can dent confidence- but there was far more to their capitulation on that day than meets the eye.
4-2-3-1 is a common formation in all levels of the game, highly commended due to the way in which it offers the defensive solidity of a quintessentially English 4-4-2 (two banks of four players in defence and midfield is difficult to break down, but 4-4-2 is susceptible in the corridor of uncertainty between the two banks) and the attacking prowess of the more continental 4-3-3 (however to play a pure 4-3-3 talented full backs and extremely hard working wingers are necessary to prevent susceptibility down the flanks caused by a narrow midfield).
Langwith, like many teams, deploy it because of this adaptability- but every formation has its fatal flaw.
The flaw in the 4-2-3-1 is that it is very easy to isolate your lone frontman. If you don’t switch the play quickly enough and stretch the opposition, any passing moves through the midfield will be easily neutralised by a decent defensive midfielder who will hardly need to move provided he marks the attacking midfielder (in this case Andy Hutt) tightly.
This forces the majority of attacking moves down the flanks, where a winger will be forced to cut inside and have a long shot (an inefficient way of scoring), or go wide and try and whip the ball in from the byline, hoping the frontman can get in front of one of the two centre backs he will need to occupy. One potential solution is to play inverted wingers (a left footed winger on the right wing and vice versa) and get early inswinging crosses across the box for a diagonally running striker- but crossing is still an inefficient scoring medium- and for 4-2-3-1 to be truly successful you need to be finding the feet of your attacking midfielder as often as possible.
In their excellent first half against Wentworth, Langwith pressed high all over the pitch. This means that as soon as Wentworth tried to make a pass, there was a Langwith player there standing virtually on the man receiving the pass ready to take the ball away. In principle, high pressure in this way makes for fantastic high-octane performances and completely overwhelms the opposition.
The problem lies in the fact that fitness dictates that (especially at amateur level) you simply cannot maintain it for ninety minutes. Because of how high up the pitch the two central midfielders (Pegg and Mallett) were pressing, Langwith were leaving their midfield virtually empty whether they had the ball or not, and as they tired, Wayne Paes was finding himself with more and more time on the ball in the centre of midfield, and he began to ping passes into the space left by Pegg and Mallett, and by holding the ball there with striker Sotos, Wentworth were able to pin Langwith into their half in the second half and thump five goals past them with ease.
On the next weekend, Langwith took on Vanbrugh, a strong outfit coming into the game with two wins on the bounce. This author ventured out onto 22 Acres with the same sense of trepidation- but what happened next was simply unthinkable. Langwith lined up with that self-same 4-2-3-1 (albeit with a few different players in the mix) – the most notable of these changes were Marcus Campbell in for Andy Hutt in AM, and Ritchie Hemingway in for Nathan Mallett in the centre of midfield. With these changes came a change of approach.
Gone was the relentless bombardment down the flanks, in was a real willingness to move the ball quickly through the middle (with Pegg’s pinpoint passes a particular highlight) and in finding the feet of Marcus Campbell, Langwith were able to bring striker Jack Parsonson (replacing Graham Jones) into play a lot more often, which in turn drew the Vanbrugh centre backs consistently out of position.
Langwith also varied their pressing in the middle of the park- when Pegg would press Vanbrugh in possession, Hemingway would sit to mop up anything going awry on the counterattack, and vice versa. This game was a much more educated approach to a 4-2-3-1, with the same energy in their pressing- but in measured bursts rather than recklessly throwing caution to the wind. Vanbrugh simply did not expect Langwith to play in such a well-thought out way, and would have complacently dismissed them as terrible.
Langwith won 4-0. Whatever the future holds for the men in yellow, I urge readers to go and watch them if you’ve got a free Sunday morning to head down to 22 Acres. Assuming they learn from the perils of 90-minute pressing, and stick to their new found ‘intelligent’ 4-2-3-1, they’ll prove staunch and stubborn opposition for the best of teams in college football, and certainly won’t go another two years without a win.