Tactics – How is Brazil’s 4-2-3-1 different from a European 4-2-3-1?

My favorite football tactic writer Jonathan Wilson is at again for the Guardian in the UK.  I have linked to Wilson here before and he is author of Inverting the Pyramid: The History of Football Tactics.

This past Wednesday, Wilson posted again for the Guardian, this time asking how the Brazilian 4-2-3-1 is different from a European 4-2-3-1. This is an article Bob Bradley should be reading before Sunday’s game.

First of all, Wilson asks the question, when is a 4-2-3-1 not a 4-2-3-1? Wilson says one of the keys may be  Ramires. He says in the article, “you realise that Ramires, who has had an excellent tournament pounding up and down the right flank, offering deftness as well as energy, could be seen as a modern version of a tornante (literally, a “returner”) who, like Jair in Helenio Herrera’s Internazionale, is a winger who tracks back. Apart from the fact that the back four is flat rather than employing a sweeper, a middle-aged Italian could easily see this Brazil as an incarnation of il giocco all’Italiana. In that regard, Brazil have become a sort of tactical Rorschach test, with everybody seeing in it what they are culturally disposed to see.” You’ve got to love Wilson’s writing.

Here’s another snipit: “Which begs the question that, if such things are so open to interpretation, whether there is any point putting a name to a formation. There is, because it gives us a basic shape, but we must always be conscious of differences within systems that ostensibly appear to be the same. In fact, one of the great criticisms that can be levelled at the English game historically is that the formation has led the game: players, rather than being treated as individuals whose tactical responsibilities were to be negotiated within a basic framework, were rammed into pre-designated holes.

So while describing the current Brazilian system as a diamond feels almost as antiquated as those British newspapers in the 50s who still listed teams in the 2-3-5 that had died out three decades earlier, so we should be aware that 4-2-3-1 doesn’t tell the full story either. And, most intriguingly, the Brazilian 4-2-3-1 differs from the European version precisely because it has evolved via a different route.”

“When forwards attack from wide to inside, they are far more dangerous. It’s funny when I see centre-forwards starting off in the middle against their markers and then going away from goal. Strikers going inside are far more dangerous, I think. When [Thierry] Henry played as a striker, and sometimes when Wayne [Rooney] does, they try to escape and create space by drifting from the centre to wide positions, when that actually makes them less dangerous.” Sir Alex Ferguson

A brilliant writer Wilson is — go here for the full article, one that should be read before Sunday’s Confederation Cup final with the Brazilians.