Walter Smith played 4-6-0 away to Ukraine.




Or was it McLeish?





Regardless, we played it against Ukraine.

Really?

http://soccernet.espn.go.com/gamecast/statistics?id=197281&cc=5739

That reads like a 5-3-2, could even suspect Faddy playing a bit deeper to be 5-4-1 but with those players a 4-6-0 looks pretty unlikely.

I can't say my memory of that game is particularly great, but that in itself tells me it was unlikely to be 4-6-0 as I have never known any other team ever to set up with no strikers and will never forget seeing us do it in Prague.

I am not defending Levein here, but as Ivan said, The Ukraine game cost us qualification in that campaign. He may not have said that was his line up, but the pattern of play was every bit as negative, as what Levein did against the Czech's, but that does not matter because it was Super Walter that was in charge.


Considering we beat Ukraine 3-1 at Hampden in the return leg, then why the need to play so defensively.

I do not expect you to see what i am saying from behind your tinted specs though.

My tinted specs?

Where have I actually said anything defending Walter, I merely took issue with the point Ivan made that we played 4-6-0. Maybe your tinted specs have seen something in my post that did not exist?

On the subject of tinted specs, I have never seen any Scotland fans, other than Dundee Utd fans, do anything but lambast the 4-6-0.

Walter is far from immune from criticism in my book, have always thought him to have an overly cautious nature at times.

In terms of costing us qualification, I would say the Georgia result was worse and then meant we had to beat Italy rather than being able to play out a draw that would have suited both teams (i.e we go through and Italy were able to see France knocked out).

Neither myself or Ivan are defending Leveins choice of tactics, 4-6-0 was an absolute disgrace. We are merely negating the Watty or Eck would be doing better argument.

The 4-6-0 was a total disgrace and should never be repeated. Levein was lucky to hold on to his job after that.

I'm not blinded by what he did for United.

However, in the Ukraine game, Kenny Miller played what was referred to as the lone strikers role, however the reality was that he was playing in an attacking midfield role. Whenever they had the ball in defense, Miller dropped off to 10-20 yards inside our own half, with our defenders on the edge of our own penalty box.

It was, in effect, a 4-6-0. However, the manager at the time was savvy enough to dress it up as a 4-5-1 to avoid the flack that would come with admitting to playing that formation.

If I was to defend the formation, which I'm not, I'd point out the fact that luminaries such as Carlos Alberto Perreira have stated that 4-6-0 is the future of football. Indeed, Barcelona play those tactics every week, because Messi certainly isn't deployed as a striker.

However we're not Barcelona, so we can't defend it.

Similarly, I never defended Walter and/or his tactics. I merely stated my counterance to the point raised that he played 4-6-0 which I don't believe he did.

Basically we are going round in circles, maybe not actually debating the same points!

Probably better to spend our time looking forward to tomorrow night than back to Prague last year or Ukraine 5 years ago?

I agree mate, hopefully we do not play 4-6-0 tomorrow and maybe have a go for a change!

Aye, hopefully can go and play without fear as nothing to lose and all to gain...in some ways Saturday was the harder game in terms of mental approach etc. maybe not so much in terms of quality of opposition ha!

nelson

If I was to defend the formation, which I'm not, I'd point out the fact that luminaries such as Carlos Alberto Perreira have stated that 4-6-0 is the future of football. Indeed, Barcelona play those tactics every week, because Messi certainly isn't deployed as a striker.
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Ivan, with all due respect, that's a load of rubbish. I had a similar argument with a mate who insisted that Barcelona don't play with any strikers as a way to defend the 4-6-0, and it just doesn't hold any water (I'm not saying you're trying to defend it, but he was). Barcelona clearly play with 3 defenders, 3 midfielders, 3 strikers and Dani Alves. Don't need any fancy articles or books to see that, you just need to watch them play! Messi may drop deep, drift wide and do many other things, but he's still a striker.

They play with forwards, not strikers.

Just comes down to your definition of "striker" then - I'd say a striker is someone whose primary objective is to stick the ball in the net and provide assists as their secondary objective. That pretty much defines Messi in the simplest terms.

Anyway, they certainly don't play with none up top! You often see Pique (and occasionally Puyol) pop up in the box in open play - you wouldn't say they play with no centre-backs (apart from when they're injured... and they play with no centre-backs *ahem*).

It's all meaningless semantics anyway, but where would the internet be without that?