It’s clear that Ten Cate (hardly surprising considering he comes from the club, Ajax, that helped make the formation so popular) and Grant (not sure what Steve Clarke thinks) feel that 4-3-3 is the way to go and despite the odd comment from Grant in the press re changing formation, it’s not happened so far –at least not as a starting formation.

“Arrrh yeah! But with 4-4-2 we’d have no width!” “We can’t change now – not at this stage of the season!”  I’d respect those view points although I can’t agree with them.

Don’t get me wrong - I think that 4-3-3 can be a very effective formation but I just don’t feel we have the quality wide players to carry it off properly. 

Wright-Phillips keeps demonstrating that he’s better inside than out wide; Joe Cole can adapt and do a “reasonable” job because he is a naturally talented player but am I the only one who feels we are only getting 70% of his potential when stuck out on the wing?   

Malouda? Hmmm…Well unfortunately he’s having what very kindly might be called an ordinary season -  He was French player of the year last season so I’m hoping that he hasn’t become “ordinary” overnight.  No doubt he’ll come good next season but I can’t see him coming alive suddenly now.

Kalou?  He can actually go past players surprisingly easily – only then to demonstrate poor decision making when he looks up and needs to release “that” pass or “that” cross.

Sinclair is another natural wide player but the youngster has been deemed “not ready” and loaned out yet again.

So, here we are with a system where one of the key factors are the wide men up front, and those wide men are Wright-Phillips, Joe Cole, Malouda and Kalou – are we to base this tail end, business end, pressure cooker part of the season around those players?

4-3-3 by all means.  It gives us width and stretches teams and it has the advantage of converting easily into 4-5-1 when on the defensive…but let’s do it when we have the players to carry it off such as Quaresema and co.

As for the “No! We shouldn’t change things at this stage of the season!” argument, why not?  Mourinho drilled most of the current squad to change formation almost seamlessly at the drop of a hat when necessary.  Have they forgotten already?  Ten Cate and Clarke are not incompetent – the exact opposite – so I don’t accept that argument. 

I feel that we are wasting resources at the moment.  We have two of the most dangerous strikers in Europe and what are we doing with them?  Well we take turns to play one and leave the other on the bench!

How many times did we read about Anelka and Drogba saying how much they were looking forward to playing with each other?  I’d suggest the combination of those 2 would frighten any defence in the world.  I bet those two are yearning to play up front together!

I’m sure Drogba´s getting weary playing as a lone battering ram, constantly crowded out by defenders, clattering into him during every attack. “Well he gets paid enough! It’s his job!”  Sure, but he’s also got other strings to his bow and I bet he’s not enjoying his football.  He’s doing all the donkey work and usually making space for others to score and get the glory. 

Drogba we know has quite an ego and I would suggest that for a striker of his quality there’s a case to pander to it sometimes.  Just look at how Drogba played last season with Shevchenko in a 4-4-2 – and just look at how many goals he scored.

Anelka had enough of 4-5-1 at Bolton.  Can you imagine how he would flourish playing off of Drogba?  I’m sure the two would develop an incredibly potent partnership – a partnership which we seem unlikely to see at the moment - What a crime!

What about the midfield? Now 4-3-3 does convert into 4-5-1 when on the back foot but the wide players must drop back and act as midfielders.  4-4-2 already gives us 4 players in midfield – players of the type which we have coming out our ears!  Makelele, Mikel, Essien, Ballack, Lampard, Joe Cole… 4-3-3 deprives us of one of these and instead we gain 2 wide men that aren’t wide men or not up to the job for one reason or another.  We are quite simply wasting resources.

Let’s play to OUR STRENGTHS – not paper over the cracks using lesser material so that we may stick to a system!  We can go 4-4-2 or even a 4-1-3-2 variant.

Example:

                                             Cech

            Ferreira         Carvalho        Terry        A Cole

                                      Makelele      

                 J Cole               Ballack         Lampard

                           Anelka               Drogba 

Or:                                  

                                         Cech

             Essien         Carvalho        Terry        A Cole                      

                                      Mikel      

              J Cole               Ballack         Lampard                 

                         Anelka               Drogba 

You know it makes sense! 

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