Those who watched any of Leeds United’s mid-season friendly outings at Elland Road this month will have spotted a subtle difference in Jesse Marsch’s tactics. The American head coach has favoured a 4-2-3-1 formation all season long with an attack-minded trio playing behind a lone striker.
It’s a formation Marsch used regularly before he arrived in West Yorkshire and it was how the Whites initially lined up against both Real Sociedad and AS Monaco, only with a twist. As Leeds prepared for kick-off, it seemed as though there was little different but as soon as they were out of possession they switched to what was clearly a 4-3-3.
Against Sociedad, Mateusz Klich could be seen dropping back from right midfield to the right side of a central three, while Rodrigo moved across to cover the space. The same thing could be seen against Monaco, only this time it was Sam Greenwood in the role, moving back to provide their opponents with three banks of players to play their way through.
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It’s a system that seemed to provide more coverage for Rasmus Kristensen, who loves to get forward at every opportunity, while also offering more strength in the middle of the park. Marsch, though, has explained his reasoning as the Whites edge towards their clash with Manchester City on Wednesday night.
“Against the ball I think it gives us a little bit more flexibility to play, we can play a little bit more tilted or we call it asymmetrically at one side or the other,” Marsch explained. “We can use the front three or the middle three with different ways of pressing where we can cover spaces, where we can kind of still attack in front of the back four in ways where we can protect and attack areas in on the ball side and then also protect things a little bit more on the weak side.
“Now, [against Monaco] in the second half, we got beat in ways that are similar to some of the things that have happened to us in the past and we're talking about systematically how we needed to address some of those moments. But the 4-3-3 can look like a diamond, it can look like a Christmas tree, it can look like even the 4-2-3-1 at times.
“We can manipulate it with small little subtle, tactical subtleties, based on what the opponent is going to present us.”
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