Dinton Casuals follow in the footsteps of Diego Maradona

Like England, Dinton Casuals have always been a 4-4-2 sort of a team.

So there was an audible murmur of confusion in the crowd at the Hawker stadium on Sunday when the team ran out and immediately adopted a more defensive 5-3-2.

The aim, clearly, was to stifle Spectra’s No.10, and the tactical switch worked excellently, with Chris Tabron operating as a sweeper behind the back four. Spectra had very few shots on goal throughout the game.

The downside of the tactical switch was that Dinton had to abandon the opportunity to exploit any offside movements from Spectra.

5-3-2 also meant our midfielders had to work harder to deny them possession. Spectra’s red-booted defender (I think they were Nike Talaria IV firm ground, but I’m not sure – I forgot to ask him afterwards) enjoyed a degree of freedom down the left that possibly made him look better than he actually was.

Bear in mind, though, that 5-3-2 is just a conservative version of the more attacking 5-3-2. Provided our full backs are prepared to work as attacking wing backs when there’s an opportunity, there’s no reason not to use it again in future.

There’s a very interesting book called Inverting the Pyramid: A History of Football Tactics, which explains that the 5-3-2/3-5-2 came into being with the 1986 Argentina World Cup side.

Argentina’s then manager, the defensively minded Carlos Bilardo, believed that in any team you need seven outfield players to defend and three to attack. But he could afford such a negative approach because one of his three attacking players happened to be Diego Maradona, then in his prime.

Anyway, 3-5-2 has given the world Andreas Brehme (who got that jammy deflected goal against England in the 1990 World Cup semis), Roberto Larcos (as Pro-Evolution Soccer calls him) and the evil Ashley Cole. Richard Hodgson and Rog are two wing backs who could hold their heads high in such company if the Casuals were to adopt 5-3-2 regularly in the future.

When Spectra scored 20 minutes into the second half, Dinton reverted to a 4-4-2, which meant Coman Wakefield, top scorer by some considerable distance for the last two seasons, could return to the attack.