Whilst I will readily admit that I am not the most astute when it comes to the tactical side of football, team formations have always fascinated me in one way or another. With Melbourne's lack of strikers providing Ernie Merrick with his own conundrum, I thought it would be an opportune time for myself to look at how the Victory coach got himself out of a somewhat sticky situation.
Going into the match, I wouldn't have been alone in wondering where Victory's goals were going to come from. With the withdrawal of our last recognised striker (and I used that term loosely) on Friday afternoon and not fully fit Carlos Hernandez on the park, it looked like an uphill task. It also had me thinking that Ernie Merrick would have to take a leaf out of the tactical book of Luciano Spalletti, former manager of Roma. During Roma's campaign of 2007/08, due to an injury crisis amongst his strikers much like our own, Spalletti effectively played a 4-6-0 formation, which effectively looked something like this.
Doni
Tonett - Mexes - Juan - Panucci
De Rossi
Perotta - Pizarro
Vucinic - Mancini
Totti
Since Merrick always likes to play the defensive trio of Muscat, Vargas and Leijer I surmised that he would effectively be sending out a 3-7-0 formation against the boys in baby blue. When you look at the formation below (my apologies to the formation gurus out there for any mistakes) that Merrick sent out on Saturday night it was essentially a 3-7-0 formation.
Petkovic
Vargas - Muscat - Leijer
Brebner - Broxham
Sukha - Berger
Dugandzic - Pondeljak
Hernandez
Which contrasts rather nicely with the 4-6-0 formation of that 2007/08 Roma side illustrated above.
The similarities between the two formations and in particular in the use of the nominal "front three" are indeed uncanny. You could easily swap for Totti for Hernandez (slightly less temperamental and unlikely to spit in your face) and Vucinic and Mancini for Dugandzic and Pondeljak. But there the similarities end with Merrick's propensity for two holding midfielders and a back three resulting in the key difference between the two sides.
The key to Merrick's success against Lavicka's men (probably his first real tactical win over the Czech) were the efforts of Dugandzic and Pondeljak as part of the "front three". Dugandzic, who played his best game in Victory colours, exposed the defensive frailties of Sung Hwan Byun on countless occasions. His sublime piece of skill that he took out three Sydney defenders in one fell swoop to tee up Celeski for Victory's third goal was truly mesmerising. On the side of the "front three", Pondeljak, particularly in the second half, rolled back the years as he turned provider for the other two Melbourne goals.
Also key to the Melbourne's second half revival was the introduction of Billy Celeski after 54 minutes. This resulted in a formation that looked something like this (again my apologies to the formation gurus) but more importantly it resulted in an increased amount of creativity from the midfield.
Petkovic
Vargas - Muscat - Leijer
Brebner
Broxham - Berger
Celeski
Dugandzic - Pondeljak
Hernandez
In the end we really should have taken more from this one, as it was three mistakes (two of our own and one by a certain referee) that lead to Sydney's three goals. Two of those three mistakes we can do something about and we can only hope that we don't get Matthew Breeze too often in the future.
Whilst this formation was successful for the most part against Sydney FC much like Roma's formation for long periods of their season, one only has to look at Roma's 7-1 capitulation to Manchester United in the Champions League as pointed out by the excellent website Zonal Marking that this tactic can go spectacularly wrong. So Messrs Merrick, Lord and Cole, it would be great if you could put us Melbourne fans out of misery and announce that new striker from Brazil they have supposedly signed because we can't allow for teams to underestimate us every week like our opponents did on Saturday night.
