Rise of the 4-5-1?

With the news today that Defoe will be out of action for 6 weeks despite personally claiming to be fit to face West Brom on Saturday, I got to thinking about the potential for Spurs to adopt that most fashionable of formations, the 4-5-1, on a more regular basis.

With the good old 4-4-2 we failed to break down a Wigan team that Blackpool put 4 past and so far our only league win has come from a 4-5-1 formation at Stoke. I know this is simplifying the argument but the advantages for Spurs are there for all to see now that Defoe is out. First of all, who from our other strikers is going to score on a consistent basis? And who can work together as an effective partnership? Pavlyuchenko is a talented striker but runs hot and cold and when he's cold he's colder than a Moscow winter. Keane is a ghost these days and I think his days as an effective Spurs player are long over, although I hope I'm proved wrong about that. Crouch is good at what he does which is receiving the ball with his back to goal but he is never going to score consistently as he showed last season and the very best defenders in the league can effectively neutralise him. Playing two of our other strikers together has rarely worked in the past and would seem to take up a spot in the starting XI that could go to a more effective player.

Here is where my argument is based. We have just signed Rafael Van der Vaart. We already have Modric, Kranjcar, Bale and Lennon as forward thinking midfielders. Despite having a bit of a stinker against Wigan I think Huddlestone is crucial to our efforts and so should start every week, pinging passes long and short onto a sixpence and generally exuding a quiet authority. Which, if we were to play the 4-4-2, would leave Van der Vaart and Modric to battle for the final midfield spot, assuming 'arry continues to play Bale on the left wing and BAE at full back. This to me seems like a waste. With a 4-5-1, we can have someone like Crouch or Pav lead the line, while Bale and Lennon maraud down the wings, Modric and Van der Vaart wander around with guile and ingenuity generally causing havoc in front of the defence, whilst Huddlestone, Palacios or Sandro can sit back and keep an eye on things. Crouch's general lack of goals would not matter so much if the likes of Van der Vaart, Bale, Modric and Lennon are chipping in with close to double figures themselves.

Midfield is where games are won and lost and it showed against Young Boys in the first leg that getting overrun in the middle of the park can lead to massacres. I believe that we are a better team than Werder Bremen but I am concerned that if we get our tactics wrong, as we did in Switzerland, we could get thumped again. This season we will be coming up against seasoned European teams who are used to playing with five in the middle. Teams experienced with the 4-5-1 can dissect 4-4-2 fairly easily. Can you imagine a midfield two of Huddlestone and Palacios for example against a Barcelona midfield three of Xavi, Iniesta and Mascherano? Ouch.

Midfielders who can score 15-20 goals a season are the Holy Grail for teams. All the best teams have one. Fat Frank at Chelsea. Gerrard at Liverpool (although they may not be a top team anymore). Messi at Barca. Ronaldo at Real. Manchester Utd may not have one free scoring midfielder anymore but the likes of Giggs, Scholes, Nani all chip in with close to double figures. The days of effective strike partnerships, little and large, Quinn and Phillips, Yorke and Cole, Shearer and Sheringham, are over. If you have a lone striker who can score frequently (Drogba, Torres, Rooney), then you don't need a second if you have two or three midfielders who can score on a regular basis.

Maybe the injury to Defoe could allow Spurs to contemplate joining this formation revolution?