Formations

The success of your team not only depends on the skills of individuals, but also on their ability to read the game, make quick decisions, and communicate with their team mates – it all boils down to an understanding of strategy.
Central to this strategy is the shape in which you set the team up – how you position your players on the pitch and how you tell them to play.
For example, how many defenders are you going to have? Who’s playing in midfield? Do you want to push wide players forward? Will you have one attacker or two? Or maybe three?
All these decisions go into deciding the formation that your team will play in. As coaches, we are unable to get on the pitch, so the formation is a vital way for us to enforce our vision on the players.
The type of formation we choose reflects the sort of football we want our team to play. The formation we decide on can be the reason the team is not as successful as it should be or the reason it wins every week.
We also take a deep dive into the variety of soccer formations available at every age group. We discuss and rate all of the most popular formations and tactics for 5v5 7v7 9v9 and 11v11.