experimental formations

3-3 is basicly how it's done in australia, depending on how aggressive the fullback is

in some cases it's more of a 3-2-1, but some fullbacks like to push up

yeah 3-3 is pretty stock standard everywhere... 3 forwards, 3 backs. variations are generally the way the center plays, up with the forwards or back with the backs or in between as a link or all three at different times... ditto the center back can hang back and cover or get involved as todd says.

stuff that varies most from that kind of setup is 2-2-2 or things like 1-3-2.... i think its interesting when people try things like the usa thing tuck described... basically using blindside and openside players like they do in rugby.


OR.... who knows what others have tried or come up with. i've heard people talk about diamond or circular formations but never had it explained properly to me.

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it's more polite on the grating than on the subs bench

It's not just the formation that can vary - it's also how (with whom) those players rotate; I was amazed when playing with a kiwi (Bridget) as our centre forward in a social comp in Brisbane a few years ago - she was rotating in behind our back line! Wot the! :-) Must say I was grateful when she saved our butts on more than one occasion.... Luv ya Bridget!

Before Sheffield, we experimented with a 2-2-2 formation to better deal with the 3m depth. It was meant to work like a continuous treadmill, ie first two players go in, then rotate in behind the back two. So there were no dedicated forwards and backs. Was very effective (strong possession game) but became confusing once you tried to do the subbing; the subs were never sure where in line they were. haha. was a lot of fun though.

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Off Half-Backs Rule

the problem with 2-2-2 that was tried (in the sydney training camp that i was at anyway) was that the 2 lead players never had anybody to offload too; so they were curling all the time losing all forward momentum

there were never really any overlaps created, limiting scoring options

i guess thats to be expected todd... when you play a wide formation like 3-3 theres obviously room to create overlaps with width... but if you play "deep" like 2-2-2 with 3 tiers of players you lose the ability to overlap with width... but you gain more ability to overlap with your depth. so i guess its a tradeoff.

2-2-2 is mostly used (that i've heard) mostly to take advantage of a very narrow pool where there is little scope to use width in the first place. actually most times i've heard or seen a team playing a 2-2-2 variant the results havent been great, so perhaps there arent many around my neck of the woods that have cracked the best way to get the most out of it.

we talked a while back about using a finswimmer in a team as a player with sole responsibility for speed and getting on the end of passes to score runaways... would 1-3-2 be the best way to work that in?

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it's more polite on the grating than on the subs bench

The narrow pool and relative depth were the main factors that got us thinking 2-2-2 for Sheffield, otherwise I don't know of any club in the US that ever considers it for tournaments. It seems that it whatever strengths it might have, it also has drawbacks and though at a lower club level maybe very simple in execution attempting to take it to a much higher level made it overly complex without the gains we'd hoped for.

For the finswimmer Idea the Fox and Bull as I'd talked about earlier is ripe for this and can be played in either a 1-3-2 or a 2-3-1, (i'm personally partial to a 1-3-2) but the difference is in where you place the finnswimmer. I think in both cases he is the outside mid/wing. I think many would be tempted to put him as one of, or the forward, but that really messes up the ability to use everyone as he is not going to have the manuverability even without the puck and so he may never be able to pick up a pass let alone get to an open hole in front of the puck.

One issue we've had in the States coming together form clubs all over is hinted at by Atapene's post about the 3-3 Just saying he we are going to play X-X-X formation then jumping in the water with bunch of other pretty decent players doesn't always translate to a good team. I think it was our biggest downfall in '98 where I thought then and still believe we SHOULD have not just could have taken silver (not to short us if i'm going to go into random speculation but I just don't think anyone was going to beat France that year) Anyway our biggest downfall was that we had practiced a 3-3 for two years, modeled it after AUS as best we could and beat up on Canada the whole time. Scrimiged a few teams in the practice week and got ruined badly. Switched to a 2-3-1 (this may have happened after our first game actually but I can't remember) but didn't really define properly where we wanted everyone and how we wanted them to play. As a result some of the guys played it more like a 2-1-2-1 and some played it like a 3-1-2 and some played it like kinda 2-2-1-1 or something hard to explain while some were a very rigid 2-3-1.
How you define where people go makes a big diffenrece as Lena pointed out. We had two guys often diving for the same puck and taking each other out of the play. It wasn't a relief to see someone where you didn't expect them.

So a variation like a 1-3-1-1 or some such can often be just re-difining a 3-3, but you have the roles of the positions set such that it is easier to describe using a completely different convention. I started trying to write a little guide about formations with this in mind as I saw so much variation between clubs here when we got together for high level potluck tournaments. I want to get everyone on the same page. it has a ong way to go but the inspiration was having 6 people in the water all playing their own idea of a 1-3-2 and everyone was expecting something different. *sigh*

Canada used a 3-1-1-1 formation to defeat the aussi's in 1986 and took 3rd in 88 and 90. I've used it several times, and it works well against all formations.

how does it work steve? i was told the old canadian style was a 4 person diamond with 2 backs hanging behind the play... no-one has explained it though.

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it's more polite on the grating than on the subs bench