by Joy English

Created on: October 11, 2010

The aim of every soccer team should be to score goals and win the match.  An attacking formation is also more entertaining and more pleasing to the eye.  Since attack is often the best form of defense, it also makes sense to attack the opposing team and force them to defend.  All this is soccer theory.  But it does not always work out this way in practice.

There are times a soccer team can be compelled to defend.  Therefore, it pays to know exactly how to play defense in soccer.

In the modern game, the most common soccer formations are 4-4-2, 4-3-3, 4-2-3-1, and the 4-5-1.  Of these, a team that wants to play defense will usually adopt the 4-5-1.  This is a formation in which the team plays with 4 defenders, 5 midfielders and a lone striker.  The aim here is to crowd the midfield and deny the opposition the opportunity of making any attacking in roads.

In the 4-5-1 formation, it is also a standard practice for one or two of the five midfield players to drop back to help out the defense.  The lone striker up front can also drift deep into the midfield area and fortify the midfield.  As a result, you have a situation where up to six of the 10 outfield players will be in their own half of the team.

From the point of view of good soccer, this may be considered a negative approach.  Yet, there are times it makes sense to play defense in soccer.  The examples below will serve to illustrate this clearly.

1) Manchester City vs Chelsea Saturday 09/25/10:
In this mouth watering clash, Manchester City knew it could not match the attacking prowess of Chelsea.  As a result, City played the 4-5-1 formation with only Carlos Tevez upfront as the lone striker.  The policy worked perfectly.  Manchester City frustrated Chelsea and used the deadly weapon of the counter attack to score the only goal of the match..

2) Manchester United vs Rangers F. C 09/14/10
This champion’s league group stage match was called the “Battle of Britain” as both teams were from the U.K.  Rangers came to the Old Trafford stadium at Manchester to play a draw.  By playing a defensive pattern, Rangers was able to frustrate Manchester United.  The match ended in nil-nil draw.

3) Chelsea F. C. under Jose Mourinho:
During his first two seasons as Chelsea manager, Mourinho simply drove soccer fans crazy.  He had a defensive approve and was always happy to escape with a 1-nil score line in favor of Chelsea. Of course, Arsenal fans may not have loved his policy but the special one was able to win two premier league trophies in a row by playing a largely defensive pattern.

So, in the final analysis, we can see that playing defense in soccer may not really be such a bad policy after all.

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