The three man defence and Gasperini's failure

Few tactical strategies have attracted as much attention in recent years as the three man defence. This, in the UK at least has become a no go after changing room bust ups and on pitch embarrassment.

A prime example of this is England’s 2-0 defeat to Croatia in a European qualifier in 2006. Steve McClaren had sent his men out in an untested 3-5-2 formation, with Gary Neville revealing in his autobiography that the system had been tested only a few days before the match. Attempts to rid the four man defensive norm in the Premier League, meanwhile, have often been met with humiliating failure. Former Inter Milan coach Gian Gasperini will testify to this fact.

He made his name at Genoa, guiding the club to promotion from Serie B in his first season in charge, and then leading the team to a fifth place Serie A finish in 2009. It was their best finish in the league since 1991.

Key to his success was his use of an enterprising 3-4-3 formation that showed a devastating attack but admittedly a leaky defence. This prompted Jose Mourinho to proclaim Gasperini’s side played “some of the best football in Italy”.

Despite of this, Gasperini’s untypical tactical tastes have since been seized upon by an unforgiving Italian media. Even before his disappointing season began, he was bombarded with people questioning how his new club, Inter Milan, would take to the new system.

Gasperini’s portrayal as a poor tactician is unfair, as analysis of his successful time at Genoa shows that in challenging games, he would shift back to the traditional four man defence (much like he did in Inter’s shock defeat to Trabzonspor.) The source of the 53 year old’s problems is not of any tactical inability, but more to do with the fact he had inherited a squad of ageing players that were accustomed to playing in a certain way.

A 3-4-3 is particularly effective against teams that deploy the traditional two central strikers and Barcelona’s 5-0 hammering of Villarreal on the opening weekend of La Liga owed much to Pep Guardiola’s courageous decision to counter the visitors’ strike force of Nilmar and Giuseppe Rossi by using a three man defence. Napoli’s exciting 3-4-1-2, meanwhile, has not prevented them from making huge strides in Serie A.

What enabled Barcelona to crush Villarreal, and Genoa to achieve such impressive results under Gasperini, was not simply the formation but the players’ willingness and ability to adapt to a new system custom-designed to restrict the opposition’s strengths.

Any new strategy takes time to bear fruit. Unfortunately for Gasperini, at an impatient big club like Inter, time was too much of a luxury.