Silva's preferred formation.

Taylor was also openly critical of other managers' tactics (without ever naming names). He felt the game was becoming over-elaborate and self-indulgent to the point of becoming boring and ineffective. When he started at Watford he took over from a coach (Mike Keen) who openly wanted to play subtle, complex football. The problem was the players couldn't follow it or enact it. I can remember sitting in the old Shrodells Stand watching them desperately needing a win and thinking "They can play some pretty stuff and they're too good to go down". They went down. Then Taylor took over and the rest is history.
If tactics was all that was needed then all you'd need to do is carbon-copy Conte or Mourinho, say, and away you go. But most coaches don't have players of Chelsea's ability. Taylor also said that you have to customise your style of play to what your players can achieve. (Not that you shouldn't improve players as you went along).
In that way players dictate tactics, if the coach has any brains.

 

GT was always slated in his time and Imo unfairly so. Watford were not a Long ball side. With Cally and Barnes we had the two best wingers in England. The players were superfit and always ultra motivated. Jackett and Taylor in midfield worked their socks. Nominally we played 4-2-4 but when you get everything working smoothly formations are only a minor part of the success. Formations and their discussion, interesting though it is, mainly give TV pundits something to talk about!

 

You and I could probably go back and forth all day long, agreeing about Watford under Taylor. Let's just say Taylor was at least ten years ahead of the game, to coin a phrase, and was wilfully misunderstood by quite a few pundits. Callaghan was the best winger not to play for England (yes, I know he turned out for the under-21s) : I watched him turn Kenny Sansom (60+ caps for England) inside-out throughout a game at Vicarage Road. I think Watford beat Arsenal 5 -1 that night. I believe he had a better assist-rate than Barnes, at least for some of his career. His problem was attitude, but that was, I'm sure, exaggerated by some people.

 

From reading articles he likes 4231 and 4141. The intriguing thing with his 4231 is that he pretty much gives the 3 behind the striker freedom to move around as they wish. I could see this suiting players like Pereyra who is great in the centre but also equally good cutting in of the flank (vs Leicester last season). This allows us to play down the wings or down the middle depending on how the game is going. Markovic, Hughes, Pereyra or Success etc. could all benefit from the system.

 

Regardless of what he intended to play I rarely saw any of this flexibility you speak of. I also rarely saw any signs that our game plan was tactically superior to Chelsea's in any way. This sounds like a post that could've been written by Mazzarri himself.

The most flexible thing about Mazzarri's formation was the wide CB's being dragged all over the pitch like rag dolls for 90 minutes by the opposition wingers (Kaboul still having nightmares). He stuck with 5 at the back for far too long despite everyone seeing how poor we were playing and how none of our CB's bar Kabasele were actually cut out to play as the wide Cb's in a back 5. None had the pace, agility or ability on the ball. In other words he stuck with a formation which didn't suit our players for too long because he preferred it, rather than choosing a formation based on the players he had at his disposal. This seems to me like bad flexibility? There were games where he played a Rb at Lwb, Rw at Rwb and Lb at Cb purely to avoid changing his formation ffs.

Our attack was slow and disjointed for a lot of the season as well. If he was tactically flexible how did these issues manage to continue throughout the whole season, surely they would've been dealt with by a change in tactics? even when we changed formation we didn't actually change a great deal in terms of our game plan, style of play. We continued to be slow and predictable, creating very few chances (barely any clear-cut) other than the odd set piece or individual skill. Not to mention his inability to make subs until 20 minutes too late. I don't have any links so I could be wrong, but I seem to remember seeing reports that the Pozzo's actually had to have a meeting with him where they forced him to play more attacking football and change his style. Again if he'd been tactically flexible this meeting does not happen.

His formation might have worked and been cutting edge in Italy, but the game is completely different compared to how we play in the Premier League. To use your example, Conte found a way to adapt and be flexible which ended up with Chelsea winning the league while playing some unbelievable attacking football and scoring some quality team goals. Walt on the other hand could not adapt to the pace of the league or figure out a successful style of play which resulted in him losing his job. Obviously I accept the difference in the talent of the squads, but Conte utilised players such as Moses, Azpilicueta, Luiz in slightly different positions and restricting what they were required to do to fit their strengths allowing them to flourish. Mazzarri on the other hand expected players to do things they weren't necessarily great at in order to fit the formation.

The comments in bold sum it up for me. How can claiming he was attempting to make players do things they aren't capable of, whilst being stubborn and sticking to his plan which worked in Italy (to his own detriment) qualify as being tactically flexible? If anything these seem like arguments which argue against his tactical flexibility

 

Your first sentence is the only one that addresses my post with any meaning. The rest of your post can be judged on its content, Edit: and just seems to be a long winded way of agreeing with me that he did not work out, which is a point I clearly made.

Some may say there is a limit to what you can do with only nine fit players, walking wounded and the kids to chose from. But I am not trying to defend him, just to point out that his tactics are about as flexible as you could imagine. That is a fact, and it is entirely likely that Conte would not be playing that system if it wasn't for Walter preceding him in Italy. It is also a fact that he stuck to that flexible system very stubbornly, and coached himself out of a job, which I described very briefly, and you did with a selection of bulky, rambling paragraphs. That, on this forum, is an incredible achievement and I must congratulate you for out 424'ing me.

 

I don't agree with your point though. Your point is that he was tactically flexible, whereas my point is that his complete lack of tactical flexibility lost him his job. Those 'ramblings' explains the many reasons why.

Sticking to a supposed 'flexible system' doesn't mean he's tactically flexible if it's continues even when other teams have figured out how to beat it. That's literally ther definition of tactical inflexibility and identical to what happen to Flores.

There's a huge difference between using a formation which is fluid and being tactically flexibile.

 

No. That is your mistake.

A fluid formation is tactically flexible, by its very definition. You can say you don't believe it is, and you can be judged on that. Fair enough.

Walter himself was inflexible, yes, but his tactics were very, very flexible.

He is not tactically inflexible, he is stubborn, and to be fair, had very little to work with for much of the season. Had to go though.

 

It is no mistake. His stubbornness prevented him from changing his tactics, therefor he is tactically inflexible. We rarely adapted our game plan throughout the entire season. I.e. Tempo, pressing, phases of play rarely looked any different from 1 game to the next regardless off opposition.

Even if you consider a formation to be fluid, if it's the only 1 you know how to implement and you have no back up plan, that makes you as a manger tactically inflexible.

We're probably gonna have to agree to disagree on this 1. I think the main thing we disagree on is the use of the term "tactical flexibility". I can see where you're coming from in terms of there being different ways to use the formation, however I don't think Walter had any idea how to implement it and think he was inflexible for the reasons stated above.

 

So, sorry, I'm not clear. Was he tactically flexible or tactically inflexible ?

 

Laxatively intractable mate.

 

As I said in my first post on tbe subject above: HE was stubborn and inflexible, much like yourself. But that did not make his tactics inflexible. They just didn't work. Him not having a workable alternative, or possibly the will to use one, did not make the original tactics inflexible.

For reference, the point I originally commented about, to which you then chipped in on, was this one:

And I made the point that Wally was percieved to be playing anything between 3, 4 or 5 at the back, clearly demonstrating a fluid, flexible formation, even if it didn't work well.

You could say he was tactically inflexible. But only in the sense that he stubbornly stuck to his same flexible tactics that won him matches against Man U and Arsenal, etc., despite the fact they failed to work elsewhere.

Ask yourself, and perhaps imagine someone else asking you. Do you think the terms fluid formation and flexible formation could be used to describe each other? If you do, your point is at best moot, and if you don't, you are, without a doubt, stubbornly in denial.

Edit: It may also be telling that his tactics worked best when he had a near fit squad to choose from, even if they weren't the same quality as Chelski.

 

I think I've just been reading two inflexible people arguing inflexibly about a man who was inflexible in his insistence on using flexibility as a game plan. & the thing is, you're very nearly agreeing, but for your inflexibility over definitions.

 

At least you understand.

 

Surely if Mazzarri was as flexible as some people say, surely he would have taken a career in gymnastics?

 

I disagree with you for all the same reasons already stated. He's only tactically flexible if he can change his tactics, fluidity of formation and manager are separate etc etc. There's no point me repeating the same points Ive already made only for you to then do the same, as this could be a never ending cycle haha.

We both have our own idea of how to define whether Mazzarri is tactically flexible or not. I say no, you say yes. Other than the definition we're almost on the same page. If everybody thought the exact same thing football forums would be extremely boring anyway

 

Great discussion, kind of agree with both of you (if that is possible) but biggest downfall for me is that he was/is a miserable feck who couldn't get the team onboard or sufficiently motivated, not just football but that won't achieve success in any walk of life.